First Times
by JoeyLee
Summary: The progression of Daryl and Carol's relationship through the seasons through their various "first" times.
1. Chapter 1

**The First Time He Noticed Her**

He had _seen_ her before, of course. He was gone half the time on hunts, and people were always milling around at the quarry, coming and going, trekking to the lake for water or laundry, but camp just wasn't that big and it had already been two weeks since he and Merle had joined up. Without trying to in any way and most _definitely_ without wanting to, he was starting to get to know them.

The cop, Shane, who he watched cautiously in case he or Merle (especially Merle) had any of the usual trouble they'd had in the past with law enforcement. Dale with his dumb hat, always sitting on top of the RV spying on everyone or huddled under its hood with steam billowing out around his head. The Chinese kid who couldn't seem to sit still. The blond one (Angela? Andrea?) who seemed to spend all day every day nagging her sister. And the meek little gray-haired woman with her head always down, never far away from her small blond daughter and the loudmouth fat husband.

Still, he tried to keep to the woods or sidelines of camp as much as possible and avoid too much (ideally, any) contact with the group. If he and Merle were going to rob these dumbasses like they planned, it wouldn't do to spend too much time at their stupid cookouts or sitting around yapping together as though the world hadn't freaking ended and it wasn't either survival of the fittest or no survival at all.

So he'd seen her before like he'd seen them all, but he had never noticed her, never thought even one passing thought about her the second she was out of his eyeline. Until that day.

He was sitting outside the tent, cleaning his bolts. Merle was rustling around inside, high as hell most likely, but relatively quiet for once.

He looked up when he heard the little girl cry out. She ran across the camp to her mother, who was standing near one of the cars pegging up wet laundry. He watched idly as the girl scrambled to a stop before her mother, holding up her hand with tears streaming down her cheeks.

The kid must have gotten a splinter, he thought, and he was about to look away in boredom when his eyes went to the gray-haired woman. She looked down at the little girl with her concern radiating from her face. She held the girl's hand gently and coaxed her chin up to smile down at her reassuringly. He watched as she pulled the splinter from her hand while saying something softly that caused the little girl to laugh out loud through her tears.

He couldn't look away from her. Her blue eyes were full of such kindness and affection that she seemed to shine. It changed her whole face, her whole body. She had gone from gray to lit up from within before his eyes. He knew he was staring but found that he couldn't look away.

From his peripheral vision, he saw the tent flap open, and his brother step out. "Let's hunt," Merle grunted, bored. He heard Merle grab a bow and start towards the deeper woods and still he couldn't look away. Her hands cupping the little girl's face. The flush in her cheeks. The curve of her neck as she bent towards her daughter. The sparkling blue eyes. He couldn't seem to do anything but stand and stare at her.

He felt Merle turn around behind him, annoyed that he wasn't following, and even though he knew he should turn away immediately before Merle made some kind of scene, he couldn't. He didn't want to break the spell. He hoped desperately that Merle wouldn't notice anything, wouldn't say nothing, but that was dumb. Merle noticed everything and there wasn't nothing he wouldn't say.

"You got a thing for little girls now, Brother?" he heard Merle drawl behind him.

His face burned. Just like Merle. He didn't know whether Merle had followed his gaze and assumed his brother was staring at the child instead of the woman or whether Merle was simply being an asshole to embarrass him, but the result was the same. His brother implying, no…flat out stating that he was some kind of pervert in front of a bunch of people who already thought they were redneck trash.

He looked around desperately to see who might have overheard and felt immediate relief. There was no-one close enough to have heard, except the girl and her mother. The little girl was oblivious, but her mama had heard and turned her head to him immediately while folding her arms protectively over her daughter's skinny shoulders. Her eyes met his and held, and he saw cold anger wash over her face. In that instant, all the weakness seemed to slough off from her and she straightened and stared at him with such intensity that he almost stepped back. She looked like a mama bear, protecting her cub, and he knew that she would die before she let anything happen to that little girl. He braced himself to hear her yell at him or call that cop over and accuse him of bothering them.

But she must have read something in his face that told her the truth. She cocked her head slightly to the side and studied him. He felt frozen in place by the intensity of her gaze. Finally, he watched her face soften, her blue eyes crinkle, and she smiled slightly and gave a little friendly nod in his direction. He almost found himself smiling back before he caught himself. This was ridiculous. Standing in the middle of camp like one of these weak sissies, staring at some stranger who'd probably be dead with her kid before the week was out. He grabbed his bow without a word or another look in her direction and stalked after his brother into the woods.

That was the first time he noticed her, but after that day, he had to fight to look away.


	2. Chapter 2

**The First Time She Talked To Him**

She had noticed the Dixon brothers immediately of course. How could she not? The older one, Merle, was electric, larger than life. He was big and menacing and loud and sarcastic. He strode around camp like he owned it. He said whatever he wanted and did whatever he pleased. Maybe there was a slight hint of…not deference (certainly not that!)... but maybe…hesitation? in the way that he interacted with Shane, as though on some level he recognized that the former deputy with the gun was the one person who could stop him if he got out of line. But it was only slight, and most of the time he seemed to be challenging Shane lazily with his eyes. Pushing the envelope just a little bit more to see what he could get away with.

She wondered if he was on drugs. She had no experience with anything like that but it seemed sometimes that his eyes were wilder than usual, his movements more frantic, his words a little more loose. Most of the time he seemed to make some minimal effort not to curse or talk too wildly directly in front of the children. She even thought that she saw his face soften once or twice when he looked at Lori's Carl or her Sophia. But other times he seemed to not even know what he was saying or care who was hearing it. That's when she wondered if maybe there was something stronger in his tent than just beer.

So yes, of course she noticed Merle Dixon from the moment that he joined the little camp at the quarry at the end of the world. But she noticed the other brother almost immediately after. He was much quieter, significantly younger, slightly smaller, but with the same blue eyes and the same strong arms. She noticed that he almost never spoke, not even to his brother. She noticed how he always deferred to Merle, but how it almost looked like he would wince when he heard him cursing in front of the children or the women. She noticed how he appeared to be poised on the edge of a fight with anyone for any reason at any time but that he seemed to flinch sometimes when his brother grabbed him roughly around the neck. And she noticed that although he made no effort to speak to anyone at camp other than his brother or interact in any way with the group, that he always came back from a hunt with meat that he would share with everyone. Oh, it was obvious that he didn't want anyone to notice or comment on it. He would stalk to the center of camp, seemingly uncomfortable to be away from the outskirts. His face would be set, and he made no eye contact with anyone. But every time he would unhook more than half of the game from his belt and drop it beside the communal fire pit. Then he would turn and walk off, not ever looking back to see if the meat was cleaned or eaten or even picked up.

So yes, she had noticed him not just because he was partly responsible for feeding her child, but because he just seemed so very _interesting_, so strong but almost curiously fragile, and so unlike any other man she had every met.

She had never spoken to him. Had only even made eye contact with him once. There were reasons for that. First, she wasn't stupid enough to be caught staring at any other man, especially after eighteen years with Ed. She knew what would happen. She had lost count of the number of times that Ed had beaten her on some pretext, claiming that she smiled too long at their waiter or at some poor high-school kid who was only trying to pump their gas. She knew what was expected from her by Ed and so she kept her head down and her eyes on the ground. It was the only way to try to avoid the inevitable.

But one day, a couple of weeks after the Dixon brothers had joined the camp, she had been caught up in an little injury suffered by Sophia. It was just a splinter, but Sophia was crying so she had held her and smiled at her and done her best to make her laugh. She had heard the older brother, Merle, make some comment about Sophia. She wasn't close enough to hear him very clearly, but she heard his mocking tone and she had stiffened instinctively, looking around and seeing the brothers at the edge of camp. Merle had already turned away, bored, but she met the younger brother's eyes, and she straightened her back. If they wanted to mock or hurt Sophia, they would have to go through her to do it.

When she met his eyes though, and saw the flush in his face and the embarrassment in his eyes, she knew immediately that it was the _brother _that Merle was mocking, not her daughter. He must have been in his late thirties, just a few years younger than she was, but as she studied his face, she thought that he looked like a little boy. His face was so open and unguarded; his eyes were so honest. She had unwillingly made something of a study of the evil in men over the last couple of decades, and there was nothing like that in his face. Only the lingering wonder of watching her laugh with her daughter and the shame of hearing his brother's words and knowing that she had heard them too. She met his eyes and felt like she knew him instantly. She tried to smile, to tell him wordlessly that it was okay, but the spell was broken. He huffed impatiently and hurried off to the woods after his brother.

After that, he seemed to avoid the camp even more than before. She knew it was for the best. Ed was volatile at the best of times, and at the end of the world, his temper was at a short fuse every minute of the day. Life went on and she didn't look at him or say a word to him, or he to her.

Until that day.

The scouting party (wasn't it _weird _to call them a scouting party? It seemed almost unbearably funny to her for some macabre reason, but that's what the camp had called them so she thought of them like that, while stifling her laughter internally) had returned from Atlanta without Merle. She sat silently at the camp's center, listening to the others talk about handcuffing Merle to a roof and discussing how to "break" the news to his brother. When he finally returned from his hunt, they told him. It was terrible. She had watched his face desperately as he reacted, willing him to be calm, wanting him to be okay. She knew loneliness, and his brother had been the only person he ever talked to. He seemed so alone as he raged through camp before being wrestled to the ground by Shane and Rick.

They left the next day to go back for Merle. It scared her to have them all gone, but as she watched him leave, pacing and screaming for the others to hurry up, her heart went out to him and she silently prayed that they would find his brother, jackass that he was, and bring him back.

They didn't bring him back. Instead, the dead attacked their camp that night and they lost half of the living.

The next morning, everything was surreal. Everyone was focused on Andrea, kneeling dead-eyed over her sister. Everyone was focused on Jim, who seemed to have recovered from heat stroke to walk around even more numbly than before. Everyone was focused on what to do with the dead, both the newly dead and the walking dead that had killed them and been killed in turn. No-one was focused on him. Except her.

She had left Sophia with Lori and Rick and followed him down to the lake, not quite sure what she was doing. Ed was dead, but the thought didn't really register, other than the stray worry of how it would affect Sophia. The only thought that she seemed to be able to focus on was to wonder who was looking out for him. No-one cared that he had also lost everything. No-one spoke to him or acknowledged him. Class and social rank were funny things, she mused. They should have meant nothing in this new world, but they still seemed to matter somehow still. To the people in camp, the Dixons were trash. Merle was no loss, and no-one gave a damn about his brother.

She saw him sitting silently by the lake, and she crept up quietly behind him. He heard her before she got within twenty feet of him, however, swinging around in one fluid movement towards her with his bow to his shoulder. When he saw that it was her, he lowered the bow but didn't acknowledge her in any way, turning back to stare down into his lap.

Taking his silence as consent to her presence, if not an actual _welcome_ to it, she slipped silently to his side and sank down next to him. She was careful not to touch him. She knew that would be disastrous. He continued to stare at his lap and she followed his eyes down, before rearing back in horror with her hand to her mouth. He had a blue handkerchief spread out over his lap and sitting in the center of it was a severed hand. She fought to control her breathing and fought the urge to scramble up and run back to camp screaming. She looked up wildly at his face, but at what she saw there, she felt herself gradually calm. The pain in his face. The tears at the corners of his eyes. She knew immediately what they must have found in Atlanta, and what he must have gone through.

"I'm sorry about your brother," she said softly. He didn't answer.

She swallowed hard and tried again. "I wish you could have brought him back." He didn't speak for a long minute and she swung her legs under her to get up, to leave him alone to his grief.

His voice was so soft that she almost didn't hear it. "Why?" he asked.

She looked down at her hands. "Because you loved him," she said simply.

He darted a look at her, perhaps to see if she was mocking him, but he must have read the sincerity in her face, and he spoke again.

"I wish I coulda found him," he said. "So I coulda ended it myself." She knew at once what he meant. That he thought that his brother was dead, but somehow still walking around in the city. That Merle needed to be "put down."

She studied his profile. "Why would you want to be the one who did it? Wouldn't it be too hard? Why not someone else?" she asked. He didn't answer for the longest time, and she assumed that he was done _sharing_ with her. That was okay. She felt absurdly grateful that this rough, tough, unbreakable man had even given as much as he had. She got up to go and turned back to camp. That's when she heard him.

"I shoulda been the one to do it. He was my brother."

She nodded. She understood.


	3. Chapter 3

**The First Time He Kissed Her**

Eighteen years with Ed had taught her how to be observant. If she watched Ed carefully enough, she could sometimes get little cues to his moods. She could move a little faster, anticipate him a little quicker. Then it would go easier on her and Sophia. It didn't always work, and some times she couldn't anticipate him because he just wanted to hit on her for no reason at all, but it didn't stop her from watching as hard as she could. Anything to make life better for Sophia.

She had plenty to watch that first night at the CDC. To have come so close to being trapped with their backs against a wall while the city turned dark and the dead closed in, only to have the heavy doors rumble open at the last minute to pull them into safety. And now to be sitting indoors with air conditioning at a proper table with a proper meal for the first time in months? The release of all that tension, coupled with the wine and the liquor, made the mood at the dinner table explosive.

She didn't drink more than half a glass of wine herself. Not that the wine didn't taste like Heaven, but someone needed to stay sober for the children. Besides, she liked sitting quietly watching the others. She watched Rick, with his arms around Lori's waist and his chin resting on her shoulder. She watched the way Lori closed her eyes when Rick whispered in her ear. She watched how Shane watched them both, and she began to think back to a few odd things that she had first noticed back at the quarry, when everyone believed Rick to be dead.

She watched the others at the table as well. Glenn with his rosy cheeks, telling jokes to make Carl and Sophia laugh. Andrea who seemed so sunk in misery, and Dale who was vibrating with concern for her. T-Dog and Jacqui as they joked and teased each other about his cooking. And Daryl.

She was still surprised that he was even there. After his brother had been lost and Rick had convinced half the group to make a run for the CDC, she thought he would have been long gone. He certainly didn't need the group. He was the most self-sufficient one there. The only one not burdened down. He could hunt and track and defend himself. She wondered why he was even with them.

She watched him most of all that night. She never had seen him talk so much, and it was the first time she had ever seen him laugh, not to mention smile. His cheeks were flushed and his eyes were so bright. He was boisterous and bawdy in a way that she never would have expected. It was hard to take her eyes off him.

She watched him take another healthy gulp from the bottle in his hand, and she hid her giggle behind a sip of water. She guessed that a little (make that a lot) Southern Comfort could get any man talking.

After dinner, she sat and relaxed in the lounge with Sophia and Carl while the rest of the group spread out or continued drinking in the kitchen. The kids played board games while she read, her feet tucked up underneath her on the couch.

At bedtime, she led Carl and Sophia back towards the offices turned makeshift bedrooms. She dropped Carl off in the room that Rick and Lori had chosen and made sure that he was tucked in before turning with Sophia to their own room. She saw Sophia to the couch in the corner and sat next to her stroking her hair until her daughter relaxed into sleep.

She had just decided to go to bed herself when she heard a loud thump from the hallway. Icy fear washed through her immediately, and she looked wildly down at the sleeping Sophia. Could the dead have actually made it into the CDC itself? She looked around for a weapon and cursed quietly when she found nothing. Finally, she picked up a heavy glass paperweight and crept to the door, opening it just a crack to peek out to the hallway.

It wasn't a Walker, it was Daryl Dixon. He seemed to have fallen into the wall and was leaning heavily against it with one hand clutching a liquor bottle and one hand over his eyes. He was very drunk. For an instant, she felt the old fear flare up within her and she wanted to lock her door and hurry over to hide on her cot. Drunk men scared her. When Ed was drunk, it meant that he could be more violent than normal, while taking even less responsibility than usual for his actions.

He must have heard her though, because he raised his head and his confused eyes met her scared ones.

"Can't find my room," he said, and his expression was so woebegone that her fear vanished and she almost laughed. He wasn't Ed. He wouldn't hurt her. He just needed help. She dropped the paperweight without a second thought and came out into the hallway, closing the door behind her on the sleeping Sophia.

She approached him carefully and evaluated the situation. He looked like he was about to tumble over. She didn't think he could walk by himself to his room. She decided to help him walk by pushing her head up under his arm until his arm rested around her shoulders. Since that day at the quarry, she knew without him saying anything that he didn't like to be touched. But he was drunk enough that night to let her guide him. His arm tightened around her shoulder as he leaned a little into her. They slowly shuffled together down the hall.

His room was three doors down from hers. She maneuvered him through the doorway and turned on the light. Of course he hadn't made up his cot. The sheets and blankets Jenner had given them all were still piled carelessly on the floor although she noticed his bow and ammunition were neatly organized and arranged on the desk. Men. She sighed, and propped him up carefully against the wall so she could make up his bed for the night.

She had just finished when she heard another loud thump behind her. He had slid down the wall and was now slumped against it with his legs splayed out. She sighed again. This was shaping up to be harder than she thought.

She kneeled in front of him until he looked up at her. "Daryl, I'm going to help you to the bed," she said soothingly.

This seemed to genuinely confuse him. "Why?" he asked curiously, "I'm all good here. Just have ta get up outta bed again in the morning."

She blinked a bit at this odd logic, but rallied. "You've had a little too much to drink, and you'll be much more comfortable in the cot."

He scowled slightly. "I ain't drunk."

"Of course you're not!" she said, employing the same tone she used to use when toddler Sophia declared fiercely that she wasn't a baby. "I just want to help you. Won't you let me?" She smiled warmly to show that she meant no harm.

He studied her face without speaking and she wondered what he could be thinking as he looked at her. Strangely, her smile seemed to make him look even sadder. Finally, he spoke. "Your eyes are so blue," he slurred softly. She stared at him. That was odd. Exactly how drunk was he?

She decided to take matters into her own hands. She drew close to him and wrapped her arms under him, linking them together behind his back. "Now on the count of three, you're going to stand up, okay? 1…2…3!"

She didn't expect him to help her much, but he surprised her by reaching up to grasp her shoulders while she helped him shuffle to his feet. She half-pushed, half-pulled him over to the cot and backed him up against it. She meant to try to coax him to sit down gently but when the back of his legs hit the side of the cot, he lost his balance and started to fall back against it. The only problem was that she still had her arms around his back, and he still had his hands gripping her shoulders. He landed with another thump on the cot, pulling her down with him so that she landed awkwardly half on top of him.

She glanced back at the door. The thought went through her head that if this had been a sitcom, this would be the moment that Dale or T-Dog would barge into the room without knocking. They'd see him on the bed with her leaning over him and back up hastily, stammering out an apology while she yelped that it wasn't what it looked like, it's not what it seems, come back!

But no-one came in, and so she turned back to the man on the cot. His eyes were fluttering closed sleepily. She looked at him thoughtfully. He would be so much more comfortable sleeping with his clothes off. Most everyone had slept fully clothed at camp. She certainly had. It was just too dangerous not to.

But tonight, locked in here underground (she shuddered slightly and willed herself not to think about that part of it), surrounded by strong walls, safe from the dead? He just would be so much more comfortable sleeping with his clothes off. She was _not_ going to touch his pants, of course, but certainly she could help him remove his shirt. Gently, to avoid waking him, she slowly began to undo the buttons of the worn-out flannel.

Before she had even gotten to the second button, his eyes flew open and he caught her wrists with both hands. "Don't," he rasped harshly, pulling her hands quickly away from his shirt.

She felt her face flame with color. He must think that she was trying to take off his shirt to…._seduce _him or something. And even as impaired as he obviously was, he was trying to stop her. She didn't think she had ever been so embarrassed in her life. What must he be thinking of her? And what did she expect? Of course a man like him wouldn't want a woman like her, that was obvious. And though she hadn't been thinking of anything other than making him more comfortable so that he could sleep, the thought that he didn't want her to touch him hurt somehow in a curious little way that she couldn't define.

She dropped her head to avoid his eyes and tried to pull back from his grasp. But he didn't let go of her wrists, and she lifted her head again.

She couldn't quite read the expression on his face. It didn't seem like disgust. She'd seen enough of disgust from Ed to know it when she saw it. Instead, he looked almost ashamed somehow, like he didn't want her to see him. But that didn't make sense, he was one of the fittest and strongest men at camp! Certainly he had been the most attractive. Still was, in fact, although she blushed fiercely at the thought. She just couldn't understand his expression. She only knew that he looked so lost.

She tried to smile, to brush the moment away. But he just kept looking up at her with that sad look, and then strangely, he again repeated, "your eyes are so blue" in the same sad tone as before.

She couldn't understand what he needed so she defaulted to what she did best. She moved to tuck him in and kiss his cheek, just like she had with Carl and Sophia. But as she bent down closer to his face, he turned his head to the side instead and their lips met. She was so stunned that she froze while his lips began to move softly but firmly against hers. _She _had meant to kiss him on the cheek. _He _had moved his head to kiss her on the lips. What could that possibly mean?

But a few seconds later, she stopped trying to figure out what was happening in favor of actually enjoying it while it did. His lips were a little rough, but warmer than she could have imagined. Then she felt the tip of his tongue rasp softly against her bottom lip. She parted her lips slightly while heat bloomed from the center of her chest and the blood rushed in her ears.

And just as suddenly as it began, he was pulling back from her and it was over. She opened her eyes to see that his head had fallen back to the pillow, his eyes shut, his breathing strong and even. He was asleep.

She hurried back to her room to hide on her cot.

She watched him from beneath her lashes the next morning at breakfast. He was no more awkward with her (or any of the rest of them) than he ever was. He sat at the breakfast table with the same coiled tension that he always showed around the group, no more, no less. He didn't blush when he saw her or avoid her eyes any more than he usually did. He even mumbled a terse "Thanks" when she refilled his glass with juice. That's when she knew. He didn't remember kissing her.

That morning, she was relieved that he had forgotten, because she didn't want there to be any awkwardness. But in the days that followed, when the vivid memory of his lips moving against hers refused to fade, she began to wish desperately that she could forget it as easily as he did.


	4. Chapter 4

**The First Time He Promised Her**

Daryl Dixon was exasperated. He sat straddled on his brother's bike staring back at the stopped convoy. The bike was the only vehicle that could get through the pile-up on the highway, and they had no sooner stopped to discuss moving some of the broken down cars so they all could drive through when the RV's hood started billowing white smoke _again_.

What the hell was he still doing with these people?

Two bossy former cops who seemed to be one step away each other's throats, a couple of dudes who looked like they had never been out of the city in their damn lives, three women (one practically still suicidal), two helpless little kids, and an old man in a dumb hat. Good Lord, what a group. Half of them were too physically weak to do anything other than run from Walkers and pray, most of them didn't have weapons, and _none _of them were going to be able to feed themselves if they ever got caught too far from a Wal-Mart.

Plus, they were moving at a snail's pace towards Fort Benning. If they weren't stopping every other mile for someone to take a leak, the RV was breaking down or the big SUV with the terrible gas mileage was running on empty _again_.

_Fixing to get yourself killed, little brother_, he heard Merle's voice say in his head. He hated to admit Merle was right, but Merle was right. Staying with these dumbasses was suicide.

Still, he was staying. And not for the first time that day, he caught himself staring at the reason he was. She was smiling down at the little girl, like she always was. Probably soothing her and reassuring her and hiding her own fear, like she always was. He studied her with a frown, his thumb slipping absently between his teeth so he could gnaw on his fingernail.

The last thing he remembered that night at the CDC was weaving down the hallway towards the bedrooms. He had somehow gotten the idea in his head to check and make sure that she and the little girl had made it to their room. He wasn't sure why. Maybe because that doctor seemed like one twisted son of a bitch. Maybe because the little girl had looked so scared as they rode down the elevator. Maybe because he had heard her mama say something about claustrophobia. He couldn't remember why, just that one minute he was in the kitchen drinking as fast as he could, and the next minute he was in the hallway walking as straight as he could towards the bedrooms. But the next thing he knew, he was waking up fully clothed, boots still on, spread out on the cot in his room. The cot was made-up, which he didn't remember doing, but other than that, it didn't seem like anything in the room was different from how he had left it.

Still, he stared carefully at the others at the breakfast table, while pretending to be as annoyed with their yapping as he always was (that wasn't hard). He was trying to see if he might have made an ass out of himself. Wouldn't have been the first time, but it'd be nice to know at least. It wasn't like he could ever go around asking these idiots to help him piece together the missing chunks of the night before, so watching them carefully was all he could do.

No one said or did anything differently around him though. Carol even seemed to make it a point to come over to refill his juice. That's when he knew that he hadn't done anything dumb the night before. He was relieved.

Then all hell broke loose. Suddenly they were trapped inside by that crazy doctor, time actually _counting down_ to a fiery end. No way out. He had been less than two minutes from dying. He knew that like he knew his own name.

And then she had saved them all. Pulled a freaking _grenade_ out of her bag in much the same manner as he was now watching her pull out a crumpled up tissue to wipe the little girl's face. She had actually carried that thing around all that time, calm as you please, and then saved them all with seconds to spare. And as far as he could tell, not a one of them had even bothered to thank her.

He had looked at her with something akin to awe the rest of the day. Unbelievable. What the hell else did she have in that bag? Saved them all, and still as quiet and meek as ever. He decided then that he would stay with the group until they got to Fort Benning. Just help lead them there, hunt a little to make sure the kids didn't go hungry, and maybe kill a few Walkers for sport. Just get them there and then let the U.S. government deal with them all, and good luck to the Army with _that_. Then he could make his way to one of the hunting cabins he and Merle had often used in the mountains. Hole up there and ride out this whole thing alone.

Yes, he had decided that morning outside the CDC as he watched her, that's what he'd do. Stay with them til Fort Benning, then good riddance. _Mistake_, _Brother_, he had heard Merle say. _Maybe,_ he had acknowledged, _but I'm doin' it anyway._

He must have been staring at her longer than he thought because he came back to himself at the side of the road to find her regarding him quizzically. She cocked her head to the side as if to ask what he needed. He pulled his finger hastily out of his mouth and turned away. He jumped off the bike and followed Dog farther up the road, eager to get as far away as possible.

Thirty minutes later, he was running as fast as he could back to RV, still trying to get the smell and taste of the disgusting dead bastard he had laid under out of his mouth. There was a gnawing worry in his chest. He had never seen so many Walkers all together, walking close like they were some kind of _pack_. He had hid under that corpse and felt them walk over and on and around him and all he could think about was whether the others behind him on the road had been able to hide too. Well, not the others really so much as her and the little girl. _Pussy_, Merle mocked quietly in his mind. _Shut up_, he thought back absently.

When he reached the RV though and saw her standing there unhurt, the worry vanished and he felt himself release the breath that he hadn't even realized that he'd been holding. She was okay, of course she was. He was getting as bad as the rest of these fools.

Then he realized that she wasn't okay, not at all. She was shaking. She was wringing her hands together. Her face was a mask of pain and fear. He felt the ache of worry again in his chest, twice as strong as before, and he hurried as fast as he could to her side.

He listened with growing disbelief. Rick had left the little girl in the woods. She was out there alone, and they were all standing up here _talking _about it.

"I'll track 'er," he said immediately. Rick turned to him in obvious relief and thanked him.

Rick turned back to the rest of the group, "Alright, Daryl and Shane and I will go after her. The rest of you stay here til we get back."

"I'm coming too." Carol said, her voice stronger than he had ever heard it. Rick started to argue with her gently, trying to get her to stay on the road where it was safe. She just stared Rick down like she was ten feet tall and started to talk over him. "There's no way I'm staying up here. That's my _daughter_."

Before he could stop himself, he heard himself interrupting them both, barking out "No!" louder than he had intended. Both Rick and Carol stopped speaking at once, and turned to him with twin expressions of shock on their faces. He knew why. He never spoke up during the group's endless debates about logistics or runs or who was going to ride where with who and when and why, and _Good Lord_, they just never stopped talking. He had always stayed quiet before. But now he was joining in. He could see that they wanted to know why.

He explained, "Can't have you there." They continued to stare at him, puzzled. He tried again, "You'll mess up the trail."

The second he heard the lie come out of his mouth, he wondered why he had said it. He'd never met a better tracker than himself in the whole wide state of Georgia, excepting of course Merle or their daddy who had taught them both. Didn't matter who tagged along, wouldn't have affected his ability to follow a trail. Besides, little and quiet as she was, she was sure less likely to mess up the trail than Rick or Shane with their big boots and their thrashing through the woods. But all he knew was that he just couldn't have her with him. The biggest group of Walkers he had ever seen had just passed by and there were bound to be some stragglers in the woods. He couldn't concentrate on the trail and the little girl too if she was standing there right next to him. Be too worried about what might happen to her. He heard Merle laughing in his head and tried to ignore it.

She was looking at him, hurt. She didn't understand. She started to open her mouth to protest, he could see. She would try to tell him that she'd be careful, to beg him to let her come.

He interrupted her instead. "Listen, stay here in case she comes back. If not, I can find 'er. Quicker if I go myself. But I'll bring 'er back."

She regarded him solemnly, still not convinced.

"I promise."

They were just two little words, just something he would have said to anyone. Hell, she should have known he'd probably say anything to get her off his back so he could get out into the woods. But the moment he said them, it felt like they had sealed some kinda..._pact_ or something between them. She must have felt it too because she nodded to him, and he knew she wouldn't push to come with them anymore. Then they just stared at each other without speaking until the sound of Rick's voice made them jump, and they both looked over to Rick addressing the group. "Alright, that's settled then, we'll take Glenn instead."

He shook his head sharply to clear his thoughts as he turned and moved off for the woods. The farther he got away from her, the more he felt his agitation be replaced by the cold calm he always felt on a hunt. He'd find her. He knew it.

He couldn't find her. Not down by the creek or up on the banks or anywhere in the woods, despite finding that trail almost immediately. They finally had to come back when they started to lose the light. He almost couldn't bear to look at her when they got back up to the road. To have to stand there and look at the wild panic in her eyes. To have to tell her that he had cut up the stomach of one of those dead things, just on the chance that it might have _eaten_ her daughter. That ache in his chest was back, and it was so strong that it was hard to breathe. He stalked off and left her to be comforted by the women.

That night, he laid in the RV listening to her cry. He couldn't stand it. He had to go out looking again, even though he knew that it was stupid to try to follow a trail at night. _Dumbass_, he heard Merle say. He didn't even bother to reply. Anything to try to make this ache in his chest go away.

He didn't find nothing, of course. Too dark. When he came back to the RV, he found her still sitting where he had left her. Her head was down and her shoulders were shaking.

"Told you. Don't have to worry 'bout 'er. She'll be alright. I'll bring 'er back," he offered gruffly to her bowed head. But her head stayed down, and he cursed himself. What the hell did he know about _comforting _a woman? Probably just making it worse. He fidgeted for a minute, caught between trying to work up the nerve to leave her and staying there all night to watch over her.

But he must have fumbled onto saying the right thing because she finally looked up at him, and he saw her smile tremulously through her tears. And when he saw the trust in her face and the hope in her eyes, he felt that ache in his chest lighten just a little bit.

"I know," she whispered. "You promised."


	5. Chapter 5

**The First Time He Made Sense**

She had had the best childhood. She was the only child of two only children, and they were all the three of them had in the world. Her parents had loved her and each other fiercely. When she closed her eyes, she could sometimes still see her mother's face smiling down at her or feel the weight of her father's fingers as they tousled through her hair. She could even still hear their laughter and the way they used to tell her, again and again, that they loved her.

There hadn't been much money, but it never mattered. They were together. She had known from her earliest memory that she was the most precious thing in the world to them, and they to her. It had been the best childhood.

Her parents died together in a car accident two weeks after her graduation from the local community college. She had walked around in a fog for months after. Her mind was empty, and it felt like there was nothing inside her but hollowness. It didn't matter to her anymore what might happen to her or what she should do or where she should go. All she knew was that each day stretched tiredly into the next with no end in sight.

A month after their funeral, she had met Ed. He had courted her determinedly, overwhelming her with his enthusiasm and energy. It didn't seem to have mattered much to him what she said back (if anything) or how she reacted, which at the time had been a relief. She could drift along with him, and he didn't care. So when he had asked her to marry him only six months after they had met, she said yes. What did it matter really one way or the other. She had been wrong of course, it did matter. But by the time she realized it, it was too late.

As the black years with Ed had passed by, she often thought that the only reason God had blessed her with such a childhood was to give her the strength somehow to face how she would have to live as an adult.

But then Sophia came along, and life had taken on meaning again. She was as happy as she could possibly have been, given the circumstances of her miserable marriage. And so in honor of her parents and the own deep love she felt for her girl, she did everything she could to make Sophia's childhood as happy as hers had been.

It hadn't been enough though. Despite everything, Sophia was lost from her. She felt the old emptiness welling up inside her the more time passed without finding her.

They had been at the farm for a few days. Her little group was still trying to feel its way as essentially _squatters_ on Hershel and his family's land. It was a strange time. The threat of Walkers had faded somewhat in the calm peace at the farm, but the mood was still as tense as ever. Rick was pale and shaky, still physically and mentally devastated by what had happened to his son. T-Dog and Carl were still recovering from their injuries, and Glenn seemed even more nervous and jumpy than usual for some reason. Plus, she knew that _something_ had happened between Shane and Lori to make them so on edge with each other, and she even had a good idea what it could have been.

And Sophia was still missing.

She watched him as he went out every day to look for her. The first out in the morning, the last back at night. And every time he came back, he would come to her, even though it seemed like it hurt him somehow to look at her, and tell her some bit of news. That he had found part of a trail. That he had found a little sleeping cubby just big enough for Sophia to hide.

Then he had brought her that delicate flower in the little beer bottle, and it seemed to her more precious than the biggest, most expensive bunch of roses in the finest crystal vase. She felt hope and relief every time she saw him, even when he came back from the woods without her daughter. He had _promised_ her that he would find Sophia, and she knew somehow that he would.

She was sitting near the house, mindlessly sorting the laundry when she heard the commotion. It was hard to understand what had happened with everyone yelling and talking over each other. Finally, she realized that he must have stumbled out from the woods dirty and bleeding, and Andrea had _shot _him. She had stood paralyzed as Rick and Shane had dragged him unconscious into the house, and Hershel had ordered them upstairs so he could treat him. She didn't leave the house again until Hershel had come back with the news. She had just paced downstairs, feeling ridiculously like a new father waiting on word of his wife's labor, and willed Hershel to come down and tell them that he would be okay.

He would be okay, Hershel had finally returned to tell them. He was dehydrated and had lost a lot of blood, but Hershel had him stitched up and pumped full of antibiotics. She breathed deeply and felt her shoulders shake. Then Rick had handed her Sophia's doll and told her that it had been attached to Daryl's belt when they had dragged him up to the house. She had felt that relief and hope surge through her again. He was still looking, and he was so close.

That night, after the others had eaten together in one of the _tensest _dinners she had ever been a part of (and that was saying something given all the meals she had had with Ed), she had fixed him a tray and gone up to the room where Hershel had pointed her. It seemed that she had finally succeeded in sneaking up on him though because when she pushed open the door and stepped in, he didn't immediately register her presence the way he always had before. He was lying on his side facing away from her with just a sheet covering his lower body.

His body was beautiful, she saw _that _right away. Lean and long and corded with muscles. But that wasn't what made her gasp. It was the sight of his bare back in the soft light of the room. It was marred with old scars and marks. Ugly, heavy, ridged scars that snaked down his shoulder blades and crisscrossed across his spine. Some white and rippled, some flat and dark angry red. Some were so small and circular that they could have only been cigarette burns.

Her heart ached, and immediately, she understood. What kind of childhood must he have had? How much pain must he have grown up with? Everything about him suddenly made sense. The reason he pushed himself to the point of collapse to find her little girl. The way he had looked at her with such fierceness on the road when he promised her that he'd bring Sophia back. She should have realized soon, she berated herself. She had known since she met him that he didn't like to be touched. She had seen the way he flinched when Merle would grab him roughly. Andrea had even told her the story he had told about being lost in the woods for days as a child, but besides thinking how _odd _that was, she hadn't put it all together until that moment. But now it all made sense.

He heard her and turned his head, moving quickly despite the injury in his side to pull the sheet all the way up to his neck. He was gruff with her, and she saw that he was embarrassed and wanted her gone. She put down the tray and pretended that she had seen nothing.

Still, she couldn't leave without showing him somehow how grateful she was. On instinct, she bent over him to kiss his cheek, fiercely pushing away the memory of the _last time_ she had tried to kiss him. He flinched as she drew closer, and her heart broke again. She pretended again that she hadn't noticed, and kissed him softly on the cheek, smelling the clean scent of his skin and feeling the rough stubble under her lips.

Then she had turned at the door and looked back at him and said the only thing she could think of to say, hearing how inadequate it was the moment the words came out of her mouth.

That night, after everyone had gone to their tents to sleep, she had slipped back into the house and up to the little room. She knew that he wouldn't be awake. Hershel had said that he had given him a pain pill to rest and sure enough, he was sleeping deeply when she came in. She sat down very carefully on the chair next to him and reached out quietly to stroke his face. She wondered at the strength it must have taken, for him to go from a boy brought up like that to a man who risked his own life for a child who wasn't even his blood.

"Thank you," she whispered, and brushed his hair back from his forehead before getting up to go. She paused at the door and looked back at him one last time. She had been wrong with what she had said to him before. He wasn't _as good _of a man as Rick and Shane. He was better.


	6. Chapter 6

**The First Time He Held Her**

It was just that he didn't go around _looking _to be touched, not like these people did. Sure, he had been touched by his family over the years. He dimly remembered his mama, though she had died when he was still little, kissing him and loving on him. And he wouldn't be able to ever forget all the times his daddy had beat on him or cut him or burned him, trying to make him a man. Merle, of course, had always seemed to take pleasure in grabbing him unexpectedly, not noticing or caring (or maybe just the opposite) that he flinched when his brother grabbed him.

And he wasn't a freak or nothing. He had _touched _plenty of women and had them touch him. In bars, the front seat of his pickup, in more dingy trailers than he could remember.

But that was different. That was all touching with a _purpose_, be it good or bad. He just didn't go around touching people just for the sake of touching them, like this group.

But he had quickly noticed that if there was one thing the group did almost as much as talk all day, it was touch each other every chance they got.

He had watched them all since the quarry. Lori and Rick, standing with their arms around each other and reaching out to pull their son close whenever he was near. Shane and Rick who would shake hands and punch each other with a smile when they came up with a good plan. Lori and Shane too, although they seemed to think that no one had noticed what had been happening back at the quarry and what must have happened after. Dale, always hovering around Andrea, stroking her back and smiling when she would rest her head on his shoulder. Plus, all the freaking women seemed to hug every single damn time they would see each other, even if it was just coming back from the water pump with laundry.

So yes, the group touched each other a lot, but worst of all, they all kept trying to do it to _him_. He'd already had to shy away once or twice when Rick reached out to grasp his arm as they discussed where next to look for Sophia. And that kid, Carl, was always sidling up around him, trying to sit next to him at dinner and ask him about his bow.

Andrea had even tried to _hug _him. After Hershel had pronounced him fit to get out of bed (reluctantly, and with repeated warnings to take it easy, which he fully intended to ignore), she had come to his tent to apologize for shooting him. She didn't need to, they were good. He knew that she had been trying to protect the camp, and he respected that. He had thought that settled things between them, but when he emerged from his tent and came down to the campfire for dinner, she had looked thrilled to see him up and walking. She had approached him quickly, her arms out, obviously meaning to hug him. He had been so taken aback that he stumbled backwards and almost stepped into the fire. She had realized her mistake at the last second and had settled for reaching out to pat him awkwardly on the arm. That was bad enough. Good Lord, this group and their touching.

But the one person who seemed to touch him the most was her. Though he wasn't sure exactly if it was her touching him or him touching her. She would reach out to hand him a bowl of food, and always somehow their fingers met. She brought him his laundry and somehow he had to step closer to her to take the bundle from her, and their arms would brush. She had even kissed him on the cheek the night he had been shot. He had cursed himself then for flinching instinctively at the unexpected contact, and still wondered what she had made of that. What she had thought about him. She hadn't said a word, and he couldn't stop thinking about how soft her lips had felt against his cheek. He had even dreamed that she had been sitting next to him while he laid in that old man's house, touching his cheek and brushing back his hair. It had been a good dream, although very strange.

Still, all that touching, even with _her, _it was nerve-wracking. Didn't mean he wasn't staying, of course. He was staying until he found Sophia and brought the kid back to her. Would take more than a stupid bucking horse and a couple of new scars to change that.

He was so frustrated though. He was just so close. He had found her tracks, found where she must have spent a night or two hiding in that kitchen pantry. He had even found her doll! These facts didn't seem to motivate anyone else. Jesus Christ, wasn't anyone taking this seriously but him?

As soon as he was able to move again, he had headed back to the stable to saddle another horse to go back to the trail. He had heard soft steps behind him and knew without looking that it was her. He had thought that she would ask him to come along again, like she had on the road, and he listened with disbelief when she had asked him to stop looking. What was her problem? Did she not trust him to track her? Did she think that he would light out just because he had been hurt a little? So he had lashed out at her, saying anything to get her to go away so he wouldn't have to face her eyes, and see his failure in them.

Later that day, he was ashamed. He had said horrible things, called her names, but she still looked at him the same as she always had. He knew then that he wasn't any better than that asshole she had been married to. He wanted to make it up to her somehow, but most of all, to stop her from losing hope in him finding the little girl. Or hell, to lose hope in _him_, period. He didn't know which it was, just that he had to do something. So he had led her down to the creek and showed her where the Cherokee roses were blooming.

With that, it was somehow okay between them again. She had smiled at him and reached out to touch the flowers with her fingertips. Then they had walked back to camp together in silence. He felt his fingers brushing hers as they walked along, but he wasn't sure whether it was her reaching out to him, or him reaching out to her. He just knew that he didn't want it to end.

They had just made it back to camp when Shane started yelling, screaming about the dead things in the barn. He wasn't no fan of Shane's by any means, but what he was screaming made sense. It was crazy to have them so close to where they all slept, where they lived. Everyone was yelling and arguing, but what Shane was saying just made sense. So when Shane asked him if he was _with _him, he had nodded. At least he'd be doing something useful, finally.

They made it down to the barn just as Rick and Hershel emerged from the woods, and he had stared in shock as he watched them drag up freaking _Walkers_ that they had captured to bring up to camp as though they were just regular _prisoners _or something who only needed a night in a jail cell to sleep it off. It had to be stopped. But the decision was taken out of his hands when Shane ignored Rick's shouts and busted the barn doors open. It was done now. With the shotgun pressed to his shoulder, he silently urged Shane on as he rattled the doors and screamed for the Walkers to come out.

They formed a line, him, Shane, T-Dog, Andrea, and Glenn, to shoot them one by one as they began to advance from the barn. Protecting those behind them. It felt good.

The adrenaline rushed in his veins, but he was calm. A shotgun wasn't his weapon of choice, but it wasn't like you could have grown up like he had and not know what to do with one. He took careful aim at each of the things, and fired calmly. He pushed down the burning anger he felt at that stupid farmer and his family, for keeping these dead things near them, near _her_, just letting them mill around inside that barn like it was nothing. He shot again and again, taking down one after another.

Almost as soon as it began, it was over, and he lowered the gun. The blood was still pounding in his ears, but it was silent around him.

That's when he saw the barn door shake again. He knew that there was another Walker still inside. He brought the gun back up to his shoulder quickly and took aim again.

Then, he realized, it was _her. _The skinny little frame, the blond head, and still wearing the same blue shirt that he had last seen her in on the road. Her head was down so he couldn't see her face, but the moment that he registered that it was _her_, that it was Sophia_, _he felt such relief that he almost smiled. Finally. _Finally_. There she was. They had found her. He had found her. She had been in the barn all along. She must have found herself a little place to hide and had been waiting for the Walkers to be taken care of, like they just did.

Then the little head raised, and he saw her dead eyes and the bite on her shoulder with the dried blood running down her neck and disappearing into her shirt. He felt paralyzed, frozen in place. He just kept staring at her, not believing what his eyes were telling him was true.

He heard running steps behind him, and he knew without turning around that it was her. Running to her daughter. About to be in the arms of a Walker. He dropped the gun without realizing it, and turned desperately to catch her before she ran past him.

He wrestled her to the ground and held her firmly pressed to his chest, one arm around her waist and the other gripping her shoulders. He was much stronger than she was, but he had to fight to hold her back. She bucked against him and clawed at both him and the dirt under both their knees. She fought and screamed, and he felt her fingernails rake down his arm as she tried to break free. He welcomed the pain because it seemed like the only thing that was real.

He understood then why the people at the farm had kept those things locked up. Why they had tried to keep them "alive" even with everything around showing you that you were a fool to try it. Because the pain of having to put that person down, of seeing someone you had loved, someone who had meant something, someone you had _looked for_, advancing on you with vicious hunger and low snarls, was just too much to bear.

He saw Rick's shoulders slump and watched him pull the gun from his holster and step forward. He knew that he never could have done was Rick was about to do. None of them seemed able to, not even Shane, who had shouted so loudly about the dead things only seconds before.

He knelt on the ground and fought to hold the woman in his arms. And he forced himself not to look away. Not to take the coward's way out and bury his face in her back until the sound of the gunshot told him that it was over. He forced himself to watch, like she was watching. He owed them both that.

When everything started going to shit months ago with dead people starting to open their eyes and getting up to attack the living, all you heard on the news or around town was that the world was ending. But in that moment, he knew that had been a lie. The world couldn't have ended then because it was ending now. It was ending here outside this barn in the middle of nowhere as he crouched shaking in the dirt and watched a cop take aim with his revolver and shoot a little girl in the face.

And all he could do was hold her.

**A/N Ahhh, the subject matter for this chapter was so heavy, I wanted to get through it as quickly as possible! I just wanted to thank everyone who reviewed and liked this story. This is my first time doing anything like this, and it is so great to know that people like it.**


	7. Chapter 7

**The First Time He Was Jealous**

It seemed like they knelt together in the dirt for hours, although it must have been just seconds. Then she was struggling to stand, and he tried to help her to her feet, but he still kept his arms tight around her, afraid that she would try to run to the pile of dead. He didn't want her to see the little girl like that. Not until they had had a chance to clean her up, to close her eyes and straighten her clothes and wash away the blood so her mama could look on her one last time.

He heard the desperation in his voice as he urged her not to look. But she wasn't getting up to try to get to Sophia. She threw his arms off her with a snarl and surprising strength and ran up the hill towards the RV. He heard her sobbing as she ran.

He forced himself to follow her to the RV, although everything in him wanted to turn and run for the woods to find something to hunt, something to kill. Anything to try to forget what they had just watched.

He expected that she would still be sobbing when he stepped in and braced himself. Crying women scared him. Made him feel useless. But he went in anyway. And he promised himself that if she wanted to hug him or to cry in his arms, he wouldn't be a pussy. He'd let her touch him and he'd try to comfort her the best that he could manage, because she deserved that.

But he found her silent and still. She turned her head to look at him briefly. There was nothing in her eyes. That somehow scared him even more than if she had been crying. But he wasn't about to leave her. He put down his bow and pushed himself up on the counter to watch her.

He sat there watching her for the next two hours. She didn't speak once and neither did he. He kept waiting for her to look over or stand up and approach him, talk to him, grab him, hit him, do _something_, but all she did was stare out the window in silence. He heard the sounds of shovels and dirt flying from outside, and he knew that the others were digging the grave. Finally, Lori stepped in quietly to tell her that they were ready for the funeral.

He tensed, ready to watch her break down, but she didn't. She just calmly explained that she wasn't going. She turned back around as though that finished it, and he stared at her profile with confusion and growing anger.

He just couldn't believe what she was saying. She was like him. Georgia born and bred. And not from no city either, like T-Dog and the Chinese…no, _Korean_, kid. He had listened to them all talk around the fire (while pretending not to) often enough, though he never joined in. But they all talked about where they were from, how they had grown up. He had heard her tell Andrea that her daddy used to take her fishing too while she was growing up, just like Andrea and Amy's had. And he had seen how comfortable she was cooking the game that he brought back, while the other women usually shrieked and recoiled from the blood as though the only meat they had ever seen had come from a damn grocery store. Of course, she wasn't any kind of trash like his family, far from it, but still he knew that she was more country, or at least had been brought up that way, than the rest of them.

So she knew good and well what a funeral meant in the South. How important it was. You went even if you didn't know the person very well. You went to pay your respects, not just to the dead but to the family and the community. Hell, you went if you hated the person, like he had done on more than one occasion. You just _went_ whether you wanted to or not. He knew she knew that. And besides, this was _Sophia_.

And he needed her there.

But she explained in a little cold voice that her daughter had been dead along, and he felt like she was punishing him somehow. All that time that he had looked and tried to give her hope, and now she was saying that it had all been a lie. He knew that was right, that he had never found nothing that really meant Sophia had been alive, but it still about killed him to hear her say it and to sit there feeling like she was blaming him.

And then she was finished, and she just stared back out the window again. She sat like a stone, not even looking at him. He jumped off the counter and pushed his way out of the RV as fast as he could.

After the funeral, he went to the creek bed alone. He had the idea to bring back some of the roses that he had showed her once before. To put them on the little girl's grave and make it pretty. So maybe if she decided to visit it, it would look somehow real, official-like, like a proper marker. But the little bush that they had stood by was torn apart, and all the flowers lay shredded on the ground or floating in the water. He knew then that she had been there, and she had been the one who'd done it. And it felt again like she was punishing him for his failure. Destroying those little flowers that he had given her to make her hope. He left the creek to head back to camp.

As he pushed through the trees, he stopped short. She had left the RV and was sitting next to the pump outside the stables. But she wasn't alone. _Shane_ was with her, and it was just the two of them.

Shane was kneeling on the ground in front of her. He was holding her wrists gently and rubbing his hands over her fingers and up her arms in a smooth, rhythmic motion. She was looking down at him intently. Their faces were only inches apart. He couldn't hear what they were saying, but they seemed locked in a moment together and were totally focused on each other. Not even seeing him standing there at the edge of the woods as he watched them.

He couldn't explain the rage that flared up in him at the sight of them together. Or the urge that he felt to run across the field and throw Shane's hands off her and grab her up against him. It's not like she was his own, exactly, of course not. He knew that. But she wasn't anyone else's either, and especially not _Shane's. _Good Lord, what the hell was going on here with her and Shane? _Careful, lil brother, you sound like a jealous boyfriend, _he heard Merle's gleeful voice say in his head. _Shut up, it ain't like that_, he thought back furiously.

Merle was an asshole. It wasn't like that at all between them. But it was something, he had to acknowledge that. Even if they didn't talk all the damn time like Lori and Rick or follow each other around like puppies the way Glenn and that farmer's daughter did, they were still _something_. He didn't know what it was, but she was the one he had stayed for and he knew that he was the one that she looked to the most after Sophia.

But now she was sitting there with Shane. Shane? Freaking _Shane_? It didn't make a lick of sense. First, he still couldn't figure out why he was the only one who saw through Shane's bullshit story about what had happened with Otis. The fact that Shane had come back with Otis's gun. The fact that he had shaved his head and acted as shifty and guilty as hell since he came back. The stupid "last words" Shane had told them about at Otis's funeral. Shane had either killed him or caused his death, that was clear as day. He thought that at least Rick would have realized it and done something to kick Shane out of the group.

But nothing had happened, and Shane still walked around camp like he owned it, and most of the time shirtless for no goddamn reason, being as flirtatious and touchy with the women as he always was. He knew good and well what had been happening with Lori and Shane back at the quarry. Weren't as quiet as they thought they were out in the woods outside camp. And he had a hunch something of the same might have happened with Andrea when he had seen Shane's self-satisfied smirk after they had come back from "looking" for Sophia alone. He hadn't cared anything about any of it. Hell, he didn't care what Shane did, and damn, it wasn't like it was any of his business anyway.

But for Shane to try that shit with _her_? And to have her actually sit there and listen to his bullshit and not push him off of her? When Shane hadn't given a shit about Sophia or her? To let him hold her hands and look into her eyes and comfort her, when he had been there instead in the RV and she had refused to even look at him?

Watching them together, it suddenly hit him how she must see him and how stupid he had been all along. He had gone to the RV earlier prepared to hold her and then stand next to her while they laid Sophia to rest. To be there if she needed him, even though he wanted to run. But she must only see him like she looked at Carl and and had looked at Sophia, like he was some kinda kid who needed to be _looked after. _Not someone like Shane, who she could touch and talk to. And all the times that he thought that she was doing something for him because it was _him_, staying close, asking him what he thought, reaching out to touch his arm, she must have just been _mothering _him, like she did with those kids. He was humiliated, but most of all, angry.

Well, _fuck _all of them then, including her. Especially her. Let _Shane_ be the one she tried to count on, and good luck with that. He decided right then to move his camp away from the group, to get as far away as possible from all of them. Then plan his next move to get the hell out of here and leave them all behind. He tore his eyes away from the couple across the field and turned to stalk back, barely registering that his hands were clenched into fists.

_Yeah, Brother,_ _you ain't jealous a bit._ Merle sounded like he was gloating, so he didn't bother to reply. Merle always was an asshole, especially when he was right.


	8. Chapter 8

**The First Time She Killed A Walker**

She was numb. It had been two weeks since they had escaped from the farm, and every day was nothing more than a struggle. A struggle to find someplace safe to sleep, a struggle to find food, a struggle just to carry on.

She existed. No more, no less. She got up every morning and tried to help the camp, tried to be there for Lori and the others. But she didn't feel anything. Only the urge to get through the daily tasks that she set herself.

No one talked much. They just moved and lived, if it could be called that.

She hadn't spoken to him or he to her since the night after they had escaped the farm. It was all broken between them.

She knew that she owed him, of course. He had looked for Sophia at the expense of his own life, and after she had died, she had treated him horribly. He had sat with her in the RV for what seemed like hours. She had known that he was waiting for her to speak, but she had found that she just couldn't say a word until Lori had come in to tell her about the funeral. Then she had told him that she wouldn't be going, and she had seen the betrayal and lack of understanding in his eyes.

At the time, she couldn't find the words to explain. She had gone to him later, to where he had moved his camp, to try to make up for it and tell him…_something. _That she was grateful at least. That she cared. But he had been too angry. He had yelled at her, advanced on her, and she thought for a second that he would hit her, like Ed used to. She hadn't been afraid. Hell, she had been hit enough that one more time wouldn't matter. And if it made him feel better, then so be it. At the last second, he had stopped, and she had waited as he hovered over her. She had searched his eyes, and just waited. For whatever he wanted to do. But he had finally turned away (in disgust?), and she felt the chasm between them grow.

Then they had found that boy, Randall, and Rick had set him to beating on the kid, or _he _had appointed himself. Whichever it was, she had seen him when he came back to the campfire with his knuckles bruised and bleeding. She had felt sick, as much as she had been capable of feeling anything. She knew why he had done it, and she wasn't so naïve that she couldn't understand when he tried to explain what Randall and his group could have done to _her_ group. She hadn't really cared about what they could have done to her, but she understood what they could have done to Lori or Maggie or Beth, and she was grateful to him. She understood. It was just that seeing him like that, being _used_ like he was the henchman of the group, only good to beat and torture information out of someone, instead of a valued member like Rick or Shane or Dale. It had just hurt her to see it. She had tried to explain that to him when she found him wiping off his knuckles. But it came out wrong, again.

Maybe it could have been different between them, not _broken, _if they had stayed at the farm, but then the farm was overtaken by the dead. And she knew what she owed him after that night. He had saved her when she stood there defenseless after Andrea had fallen, seeing death coming at her from all sides.

The final break between them came the next night after that they had escaped from the farm. They had lost three - Dale, Shane, and Andrea - and gained three - Hershel, Maggie, and Beth. They had all sat around the fire after Rick's speech, and she had been appalled. Listening to Rick, the numbness in her receded somewhat. She wanted to tell him that they didn't have to live the way Rick was proposing.

She hadn't meant to insult him by calling him Rick's henchman. Despite the breach between them, she had just been trying to make him _see_, that he was the type of man who had looked for a little girl, who had saved her life and the group's, who was _better_ than all this. But what she had said came out all wrong yet again. She had seen that in his face. And whatever her intent, he was insulted, gravely so. She could tell.

Since that night, she didn't think that he had looked at her once. He was like a machine. He traded off for double watches every night and spent all day, every day hunting or scouting with Rick. He looked to _Rick _now, talked to him as much as he ever talked to anyone. More than he had ever talked to her. If it had been two weeks earlier, she would have been so happy to see him connect with another member of the group besides her. But now it just felt cruel and sad. It was all broken between them, whatever connection that they had had, and she couldn't see any way to get it back.

And so, she felt adrift. Sophia, Dale, Andrea, Hershel's family, the farm, all of it. What was the point in all this. The old ache and blackness she had felt when her parents died was back, and she just spent each day existing. In the only part of her that _cared_ about anything, she wished that she could make it alright again between them and to have that unspoken…whatever it was between them, again. But she just didn't have the energy or strength to try. And given how he hated her now, no point anyway.

The group stopped for the night outside a burned-down house in the woods. It was dusk, and everyone was setting up camp for the night, falling into the routines they had slowly established every night since the farm.

She could hear a stream babbling faintly, and she pulled herself wearily to her feet to go draw some water. She knew that she wasn't supposed to go alone. Rick was adamant on that point - stay in groups of two, at _least_, at all times. But looking around the little campsite, she didn't see anyone who she wanted to disturb to go with her.

She could have asked him. He was cleaning his bolts, sitting alone away from the group near one of the cars. But she wouldn't. She couldn't. They hadn't talked since that night at the dying fire, and she didn't want to bother him. She knew that he hated her now as weak, as somehow still alive when people like Sophia and Andrea and Dale were dead, and it hurt to look at him. Or hurt as much as she could feel anything these days.

So she slipped away quietly by herself. She was almost to the creek when she heard it. The unmistakable growl and the shambling steps of a Walker. She turned quickly, bucket in hand, to see the thin figure reaching out for her, barely ten steps away. It was old, older than Hershel even, but still intact for the most part, save for the bite on its neck. _Just like Sophia_, she thought.

She was unarmed, had nothing except her boots and the clothes that she was wearing and the bucket she was carrying. But she could have run, could have screamed. Instead, she just stood there and watched as it shuffled closer.

She knew that the group thought they understood why she had rushed towards Sophia at the barn. That she had wanted to die by having her daughter bite her. And she knew that they all still considered her a suicide risk, or whatever the term was. They all spoke to her (except _him _of course) as though she would snap at any time. They walked on eggshells. Petted her and tried to console her. She let them, because really she didn't care one way or the other.

But suicide hadn't actually been what she was thinking that horrible day when he had caught her as she tried to rush past him. She hadn't been thinking that if she had succeeded in running to Sophia, that her daughter would have bitten her and she would have been dead. She had only wanted to hug Sophia again and look into her eyes one last time.

It was only after the barn that she began to think of how it would have been easier if he had not caught her. If she were no longer with the group. So while she hadn't been thinking of "Death by Walker" (such a clever but macabre term - she had heard Glenn whisper it to Maggie) that day, when the old man shuffled to her, she studied it carefully and wondered almost clinically if maybe it wouldn't be for the best. She was a burden, everyone knew it. And really, what was the point of all this. It was all going to end sooner or later, so why not sooner?

She stood motionless. The old man stumbled closer, hissing as it reached for her. She stepped back slowly almost as an afterthought, but really just in reflex, not to avoid the arms reaching out for her. As she did, her heel caught on a tree root behind her, and she fell heavily on her back.

The old man moved quickly. It knelt and began crawling, beginning to move in a frenzy as it got closer. She could smell the horrible stench from its body. Its hands grasped at her knees as it pulled itself closer.

And still she did nothing. She just watched it crawl closer to her. She just watched its dead eyes as the gray face came closer to her own. And she felt calm and at peace

That's when she heard him. He must have followed her down to the creek. He was tearing through the brush, yelling his head off as he sprinted towards her. She tore her eyes away from the old man to watch him. He was running as fast as he could, pulling the bow from his shoulder violently, trying to notch the bolt at a run. He was yelling her name as he ran towards her, and she felt faint surprise. It was the first time that she had ever heard him say her name.

None of it mattered though, he wouldn't get there in time. There were trees in the way and the old man was almost on her.

She looked up over the old man's shoulder at him one last time, and that's when she really registered the look on his face. He was so _alive_ as he ran towards her. He was so ready to fight. So desperate that she should fight too. It was the same determination that she had seen when he promised to find Sophia. And here she was just lying in the leaves, waiting for death. Doing nothing. Just being a burden, like she had told him that she was.

With that, the trance seemed to lift and everything that had frozen her in place broke. She bucked up violently and partially dislodged the Walker from her lower body. Then she turned desperately so that she was on her knees, and she kicked and kicked and kicked. She clawed and scraped at the ground to get away. Her scrabbling fingernails finally caught a rock, and she turned back to the Walker with a scream. She lifted the rock with all the strength she had left, and she smashed the old man's face in.

The Walker fell on top of her, still at last, and she collapsed back on her back and stared at the trees above her. She watched the them moving slowly in the dying afternoon breeze. Even through the branches, the filtered light was pure and bright. She just lay there on the ground and savored it.

He reached her a second later. Cursing, he dragged the thing off her and pulled her up against him so roughly that it hurt. He ran his hands up her arms and neck, moving her limbs and face violently from side to side, searching desperately for a bite or a scratch. She just stood quietly and let him, while he railed at her for being so _fuckin' stupid_ to go out alone.

Standing there looking at him and feeling his concern through his rough hands and curses and shouts, she realized that although life would never be as joyful as it had been when Sophia was alive, she wanted to _live. _She _needed _to live every day as though it were a gift, so she could honor Sophia and all the others who had been lost. And she vowed in that moment, that she would do it. She would fight every day. She would make herself indispensable to this group, her new family. She would try to help them and make them happy. Life would never be the same, but it would get better.

And in the months that followed, it did. And every morning that she woke up, surrounded by her family, and friends, and him, she could trace it all back to the moment when she saw his desperate face, and had decided to live by killing her first Walker.


	9. Chapter 9

**The First Time He Took Her On A Run**

She was different now, somehow. For days after they left the farm, she had been silent and gray. She had moved like a ghost. She hadn't spoken to anyone unless spoken to. She no longer had tried to talk to him or reach for him. It was like she didn't even notice that he was there.

He knew that she blamed him for Sophia, for beating that kid, for killing Dale. He was a _henchman_ to her, that's what she had said. So he had tried to stay as far away as possible, while watching her as carefully as he could.

But she started to change after that one afternoon. That day, he had watched her listlessly stand and drift away with a bucket in hand towards the creek. He had been angry. She knew that no one was supposed to be wandering off alone, and there she was wandering away, not even bothering to ask anyone to go with her, even though he had been sitting right there.

He hadn't intended to follow her. Let her get herself killed, he was done looking for people. But he hadn't been able to concentrate on what he was doing from the moment she left his sight, and finally he had given up, jumping up with his bow to go after her.

As he followed her tracks, he heard the unmistakable sound of a Walker. He had taken off at a run, terrified. As he ran through the trees, he had seen her on the ground on her back. The Walker was pulling itself closer to her, just seconds away from biting her. He had shouted to her, tried to pull his bow around to take a shot, even though he knew at a glance that he would never get there in time.

She had met his eyes as he ran to her and suddenly, she was a blur of movement. She turned and kicked and dragged herself along the ground. Then he had watched as she grabbed a rock and with a yell, had turned and bashed the dead thing's face in.

After that day, she changed. Not all at once and not overnight, but gradually she became the heart of the camp. She seemed to be everywhere at once. Hugging Lori and murmuring to her when Rick left angry after another argument. Smiling and patting T-dog on the arm when he would come back from a successful run. Holding Beth and stroking her hair when she would cry. Listening intently to Hershel as he explained something or tried to show her some medical technique. Always cooking and cleaning and organizing and loving on everyone. Except for him and Rick. Hell, he already knew why she hated _him_, but he figured that she must blame Rick for Sophia as well.

It was a month since he had seen her kill the Walker. Maggie was sick, something she'd eaten. Rick thought it would be best to treat her by making a quick run to a little pharmacy in a nearby town. Rick suggested that he go on the bike to get in and out as quickly as possible. He nodded, that made sense.

But Rick didn't want him to go alone. Not because he needed back-up (he almost laughed when Rick rushed to assure himof that fact, because it was so ridiculous), but because Rick thought it best to have someone along who could judge what medical supplies they needed. He watched Rick turn hesitantly towards Hershel, clearly wanting him to go along but afraid to ask him to leave his daughter when she was so ill.

Then he heard her. "I'll go with Daryl so Hershel can stay here." He felt his head snap towards her in disbelief. This was crazy. He didn't want her with him. They hadn't been alone together since he had watched her kill that Walker.

"You ain't going nowhere with me," he said shortly, turning towards Rick prepared to plead his case.

"Then I'll go with T-dog," she said calmly, ignoring him.

Well, _that _wasn't ever going to fucking happen, he thought. If she was going out, it was going to be with him. So he could keep an eye on her.

They rode in silence to the town that Rick had circled on the map and the little mom-and-pop drug store that was supposed to be there. He was frustrated. She had ignored him and avoided him for weeks, and he was finally getting used to it. And now they were alone together and she was sitting behind him and he had no idea what to say or do, he just knew that he didn't like it.

She had ridden with him once before, that night the farm fell. She had clutched him desperately that night, shivering and shaking as she buried her face in his back. This time it was different. She sat upright and erect, her hands barely hovering around his waist. It was clear that she didn't want to touch him, and it annoyed him all over again. He hadn't wanted her to come at all. It wasn't like he _wanted_ her to lock her hands around his front, but at least she could acknowledge that _she _was the one putting _him_ out, and not the other way around.

They found the little drug store and dismounted the bike. He was careful to park just at the back of the store, behind some other cars, so they couldn't be seen from the street at the front. He gestured to her to follow and led the way carefully to the street and into the store.

They didn't speak. She moved efficiently up and down the aisles, rejecting some medicines and scooping up others. She pointed to ones that he should take, and he filled his pack. Then she moved towards the back of the store and slipped into the little dark office that lay behind the counter. He hurried after her, cursing silently. She just walked straight in! Without him in front of her! What if there had been Walkers? This woman was going to be the death of him.

He followed her in and scanned the little room in the light of her flashlight. It was empty, nothing to take. He started to turn back to the front of the store.

That's when he heard it. The ringing bell from the front of the shop. Someone or something had walked in.

Moving cautiously, he looked slowly around the corner of the office door. It was two men. Both heavily armed and dressed in camo and knock-off military vests like they were on some freaking paintball trip.

Shit, he cursed to himself. There was no way out, except through the door of the office. They were trapped here in the back room, and he wasn't sure that he could take both men and whoever the hell else they had with them out front with just his bow. And _she _was there.

He looked around quickly. There was nowhere to hide in the little room. But…maybe if he pushed her behind the open door, so that she was tucked into the corner, and then pulled the door back fully ajar, she could hide in the little corner that the door made. And he could slip out front and try to take down both of the men before they came back to her. It was risky (_Suicide, actually_, Merle observed dryly), but maybe it would work.

That's what he'd do, he resolved. He turned to her quickly and gestured first to her, then to the corner behind the door. Then he positioned himself closer to the door entrance. He looked behind him, thinking that he would see her follow his instructions and tuck herself frightened behind the door while he went out front.

But she just looked at him and shook her head firmly. She seemed to understand what he proposed to do without any words between them. He gestured again, more forcefully, trying to argue with her without speaking. Couldn't she see that there might not be enough room for them both behind the damn door? She just stood there and shook her head again.

He was so frustrated that he wanted to scream. Damn this woman and her stubbornness.

He could hear the men moving closer to the back of the store. So he did the only thing he could think of. He reached out and grasped her by the forearms and pulled her close to him, stepping backwards into the little corner behind the door and pulling the door back to shield them both.

It was a tight fit, just like he had figured. She pressed closely to him to make herself as small as possible, and he wrapped his hands around the small of her back to pull her closer still, cursing again that it left him unable to reach his bow.

Her face was nestled against his neck and he felt her trembling. Silently, her hands crept around him, reaching for his back. He thought that she was afraid, and so he tightened his grip around her. But then he felt her hands fumbling at the back of his belt, and he realized that she was trying to pull out the knife hanging there. He felt a rush of pride at her, for looking for a weapon to protect herself, him, _them_. And he felt a rush of shame that he hadn't ever bothered before to make sure that she was properly armed, so she could defend herself. He vowed to himself that if they could just make it out of this, he'd see that she never was unarmed again.

The men moved efficiently through the front of the store, while the two of them stood there in the dark, waiting and listening. He could hear the point man moving closer to the office. Then he heard the man step just over the threshold, and he tensed. If the man did any kinda proper search, he'd find them immediately. He felt her holding her breath and he found himself holding his.

"Martinez," the second man suddenly called from the front of the store, "let's go. Boss wants us back to town ASAP." The first man stepped back out of the office and joined the other. They heard the front door jangle again as they left.

They stood wrapped around each other in silence for several long minutes, straining to hear whether the men were truly gone. But it was silent. It was safe.

Still, they didn't move. She kept her arms tightly around him. He just rested his cheek against her temple, feeling her body against his and listening to her heartbeat and breathing her in. It seemed to go on forever. Then, to his intense embarrassment, he felt his body start to react to her closeness, and he pushed her away, more roughly than he intended.

He led the way back to his bike cautiously, searching intently for any signs of danger. But the men were gone. He got on the bike and felt her climb on gingerly behind him. She seemed to be careful again not to touch him, only resting her hands just barely at his hips. It annoyed him. After what they had just been through?

He started the bike and started to push off down the street. "Thank you for saving me again." She said softly from behind him. He heard himself snort. This woman and her thank yous. He hadn't done nothing but stand there and hold her.

She didn't speak again, but he felt he had to respond. "Never taking you on a run again. I ain't a cat - don't have nine lives to spare."

Even over the noise of the engine, he heard her laugh. She leaned closer to him, and he felt her fingers tighten around his waist. They rode back together in silence towards the group. He made a note, have to tell Rick when they got back that from now on, she only went out on runs when he could be along with her.


	10. Chapter 10

**The First Time He Gave Her A Christmas Present**

It was Christmas, or as near as they could tell. Fittingly, they had stopped for the night in a little abandoned country church. The only windows were high off the floor, and they barricaded the front and back doors with some turned-over pews. It was as safe as it could be for the night.

The mood was mostly subdued, of course. It was nothing like the Christmases of the past, for any of them. But still the group sat around in a circle and laughed and talked and exchanged little gifts. She found a little packet of bobby pins in her bag that she had been saving for Sophia to give to Beth. They had all been gathering up candy in the past couple weeks to give to Carl. Lori gave her a new pair of socks that she had been hoarding, and she smiled at her friend with affection at the thoughtful gift. Funny how the little things that would have barely merited the name "present" in the past were so precious now.

T-dog even produced three bottles of wine that he had found the day before, and they all toasted together (save for Carl and Lori), while Beth sang Christmas carols quietly from a little hymnal she had found.

He wasn't with them. She had heard him tell Rick gruffly as soon as they had secured the back door that he would take watch, and she watched him out of the corner of her eye as he marched upstairs. There was a little empty office in the steeple up there, she heard him say. Windows all around so they could see if anyone or anything was approaching.

It didn't surprise her that he didn't want to take part. He was as much a part of the group as any of them, but he still seemed more comfortable on the outskirts just like he had been back at the quarry. And he only really seemed comfortable talking to Rick now anyway. Certainly more comfortable than he was talking to her or even being near her.

When it was time for bed, she stumbled over a little tipsy to her bedroll that had been laid out between Lori and Beth's. That's when she noticed that there was something sitting on the pack that she used as a pillow.

It was a brown paper bag, neatly folded over. She opened it curiously and drew out a shiny new buck knife. There were no markings on the bag and no note, nothing to show where it had come from or who had placed it there. But she knew immediately that it was from him.

A month before they had been almost caught while on a run together. She had seen his frustration when they had been trapped together in the little back room, and seeing him search the room frantically for a way out, she had been ashamed that she was unarmed and still all but helpless. A burden, despite everything she had tried to do to remake herself in the weeks since she killed that Walker. Not any kind of proper back-up for him.

Still, she had tried to reach for his knife as they waited pressed together behind the door. To do what she could if the men did find them in their hiding place. And since that day, she had been on the lookout for a knife of her own, but hadn't come across anything yet, other than a little rusty dagger that had seen better days. But this was perfect. She was surprised and touched that he had remembered.

The wine gave her unexpected courage so she decided to slip upstairs before she could lose her nerve. To thank him and apologize and try to get him to _talk _to her again, even if it was only to say Merry Christmas.

It was a small room, old Bibles and hymnals stacked to the windows. There was no bell in the steeple, only a little table to serve as a desk.

He was standing at one of the windows, his bow on the floor at his side, his eyes sweeping the fields around the church. She knew he must have heard her climb the stairs, but he didn't turn around. Just kept staring out at the ground below. It was obvious he didn't want her there, disturbing his watch. Still, she couldn't leave it like this between them.

She felt flushed and awkward. They had only been alone together twice since the farm. The first time when he had come upon her after she had killed the Walker, and the second when they had gone on the run together. Neither time had he seemed happy to see her nor displayed any interest in talking to her, other than to scold her fiercely for going off alone or tell her she wasn't coming out on runs anymore. She had tried since then to catch his eye, to smile and invite him to sit with the group, but the closer she got to Lori and the others, the more he seemed to seek out just Rick for company.

She hopped up on the table facing his back, swinging her feet back and forth nervously. He didn't look back at her, and the silence stretched between them.

She cleared her throat. "I just wanted to thank you," she said. "For the knife." He turned to her and regarded her seriously, one finger slipping up to his mouth so that he could chew on his fingernail. For a second, she thought that he might deny that he was the one who had given it to her, and she felt acutely embarrassed for calling him out when he obviously didn't want her to acknowledge it.

She had just decided that he wouldn't be answering her, when he spoke. "Didn't want you tryin' to take mine again next time we're on a run." She grinned over to him, relieved, and saw his lips quirk a little in a smile back. But then she was so anxious to make it right between them again that she couldn't stop the words from rushing out to ruin it all.

"I'm sorry about what I said about Randall and what I said that night after the farm and I'm sorry that I didn't say thank you earlier, for everything, for you going after Sophia and…"

She stopped babbling when she saw him wince slightly, and she looked down helplessly at her hands in her lap. She had messed up again. It had been a mistake to mention Sophia, she could tell by the look on his face.

She kept her head down, wondering how to salvage this. She couldn't stop swinging her feet under her as she sat on the table, just like a little kid in a too big chair, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. She knew it was annoying; she could tell that it was annoying even with half a bottle of wine in her. But she just couldn't stop.

She heard him move away from the window and come closer to her. Still, she couldn't look up. He stepped forward until he stood just between her knees. She could feel the heat of his body with his nearness. He put his hands out to rest on each of her legs and pressed down gently. She stopped swinging her feet and finally looked up.

"Stop apologizin'" he said softly, looking down at her. His eyes were so blue, and that reminded her frantically of what he had said to her when they had been alone at the CDC. At the thought of that night, and of him kissing her before passing out while she laid awkwardly across him on the cot, she felt herself blush and without meaning to, her eyes dropped down to his lips.

She couldn't seem to stop herself. She felt her chin tip up slightly and she swayed forward just a little, looking up again to meet his eyes. She couldn't read the expression in his face, but he didn't move his head back. Just continued to stare down at her. And then, she felt his hands grip her knees a little more firmly. She searched his face and felt almost as though he was leaning closer to her...

"Daryl?" she heard Rick say from the stairwell. She jumped, and they both turned quickly to see the light from a flashlight shining off the walls as Rick came up the stairs. She darted her head back to him, but he was already turning away. He took his hands off her legs and stepped back to look again out the window.

Rick walked in and stopped short to see her there perched on the table, feet swinging even more furiously than before. "Oh…Carol, I'm sorry. Just wanted to talk over the plans for tomorrow with Daryl."

She forced a laugh and jumped off the table to head for the door. She kept her head down, hoping Rick wouldn't notice her flushed cheeks and if he did, maybe just blame it on the wine. "Don't mind me, Rick, just saying Merry Christmas!" Her voice sounded high and unnatural, even to herself. Rick moved aside to let her pass, and she started to head down the stairs.

"Carol?" She heard him say behind her before Rick could speak. She paused in the doorway, waiting. "We're good."

She didn't look back or respond. Just made her way as quickly as possible back to the group and crawled in her sleeping bag between Lori and Beth. She felt her cheeks burning. _We're good_? Andrea had told her that he had said the same thing to her after she had mistakenly shot him.

Two more seconds and she would have been trying to kiss him, and all he was thinking was "We're good." Translation, no doubt, "stop bothering me, woman."

She was mortified. Every time she was around him, she did something to embarrass herself or invade his space or make him uncomfortable. She had to stop. He was a member of the group. She couldn't make him feel like she was _hanging _on him or that he needed to be something to her that he wasn't to any of the others. It just wasn't fair to him.

She resolved that from then on, she would give him his space and stop trying to make him something that he didn't want to be. As she drifted off to sleep finally, head spinning, her hand closed around the knife under her pillow. She smiled a little. Even though she was embarrassed as hell, it was still the best Christmas present she had ever gotten.


	11. Chapter 11

**The First Time He Asked For Her Help**

It felt like he was back in freaking high school all over again. The gossiping. The cliques. The group was together all day every day, all up in each other's business, each other's secrets.

Not that it was any kind of secret the situation between Lori and Rick. At best, they talked to each other with icy politeness and cold clipped voices. At worst, they were yelling their heads off at each other. And everyone seemed to think they had to take sides between them. He was on Rick's side, _obviously _(he almost laughed at the thought of the alternative). And _she _was on Lori's. But everyone else seemed to gravitate away from Rick too as their leader became more and more removed from them. He knew that Rick was just focused on survival, for_ all of them_, but the rest of them didn't seem to see it that way.

That day, the group had come across a herd on the road, blocking the way into a little town where they hoped to gather supplies. Rick had volunteered to jump in a car and drive off in the opposite direction, honking the horn, leading the Walkers away alone while the rest of the group had retreated to safety. It had been risky. And brave. But when Rick had finally returned to the meet-up point, no one had thanked him or even acknowledged him. Except for Lori, who had rushed at him, yelling about leaving her and Carl. Rick just took it for awhile before turning to head towards the woods without a word.

He had been watching Rick become thinner and grayer ever since they left the farm. The burden of "leadership" weighing down on him. Lori was obviously the ringleader of the "I Hate Rick" team, but in his opinion, it was really Carol who was influencing the rest of the group. 'Course he didn't think she was doing it on purpose, or even that she knew she was doing it. But the rest of them looked to her now. She was Lori's best friend. Beth's surrogate mother. Hershel and T-dog liked and respected her. Hell, all of them looked to her for support, even him. And so he thought they must be picking up on her attitude towards Rick. And he thought that if there was any way of trying to fix this, it would lie with her, not freaking Lori.

He waited for his moment. When she was kneeling by the campfire, making dinner alone, while the others spread out to set up camp, too far away to overhear what he was about to say.

He approached her cautiously. He was careful with her since Christmas night. She had come up to thank him for the knife, and it had been obvious that she was more than a little tipsy. She had sat on the little table swinging her feet furiously and babbled and babbled.

He had realized that she was nervous for some reason, so he had come closer to her and put his hands on her legs to calm her. And for just a moment, he had had the crazy thought that she wanted to kiss him. Or _him _to kiss her. That couldn't have possibly been true, but he could have sworn that's what she wanted.

But he had hesitated. She wasn't some drunken hook-up, or shouldn't be. This was _Carol_. Still, she had looked so flushed and pretty, that he felt himself leaning down to her. Then he had heard Rick climbing the stairs, and the moment was gone. Whatever she had been thinking, she couldn't leave the room fast enough to get away from him and Rick.

The next day, she had acted like nothing had happened, and he had thought that he must have imagined the moment. Or that she regretted it or blamed it on the booze. Really, what did it matter the reason? Whatever it was, it hadn't been repeated, and although she now spoke to him more than she had since the farm, it was with the same cheerful warmth that she showed everyone, no more no less. So in the weeks since Christmas, he had tried to respond to her in the same way, while pushing away the memory of her face looking up at him in the steeple.

He reached the fire and stood across from her. She looked up when she heard him approach, smiling automatically although it seemed the smile became just a bit forced when she saw that it was him. She didn't speak, just looked back down to her work.

He took a deep breath. It was now or never. "Listen, it ain't Rick's fault."

She seemed to understand what he meant immediately. He saw her shoulders stiffen and when she glanced up at him again, her face was cool.

"It's not Lori's either."

Well, _that _was seriously debatable in his opinion. From what he could see, this was all nothing _but _Lori Grimes' fault. But there wasn't no point in arguing with her. He needed her help too much.

"Look. He's stretched thin. Feelin' guilty. About everything. The farm, Shane, Soph…I mean, her, everything."

She didn't respond, just kept stirring the pot over the fire. Well, this was hands down the most uncomfortable conversation of his life. He was itching to get away. But, he had started this, so he had to see it through.

"Y'all are isolatin' him. Makin' him feel like he's alone, like he's got nothin' left."

That seemed to irritate her. She glanced up at him again. "He has you."

He rolled his eyes. Did she honestly think that him and Rick hung out in the woods, hugging and sharing their feelings together? The only thing he had gotten from Rick was a couple of terse explanations spaced out over the past few months. That, and the fact that he was _observant_ (even if no one else around here was), were the only ways he knew what was going on.

"That ain't what I'm talkin' about, and you know it. We have to stick together, or the group will just stay broken." She ignored him. He felt himself growing desperate.

"Carol," he tried one last time. "Please."

This time she stopped what she was doing and looked up at him with her full attention. She dropped the spoon and stood up, head tilted to the side, regarding him carefully. They looked at each other in silence while he just hoped like hell that she would understand, that she would _help _him.

Whatever she read in his face as she stared at him seemed to convince her. Finally, she nodded. "Okay. I'll try."

That night, when everybody gathered around the fire for dinner, he watched as Rick came back from his rounds. No one spoke to him. He watched Rick sit gingerly on a rock a few feet from Lori and Carl, just outside the circle of the group.

He looked over and met her eyes. She seemed to sigh, and then to square her shoulders. She stood up and walked to stand in front of Rick. He watched Rick look up in surprise when she placed her hands on his shoulders.

"Rick," she said clearly and softly, but in a voice loud enough to be heard by the whole circle, "Thank you for everything today and everything you've been doing for all of us." Then she leaned down and hugged him tightly.

The gratitude he saw in Rick's eyes made him turn away in embarrassment. He looked around the circle instead and saw the others watching the two of them. And he knew then that it was going to be okay. With her quiet influence and strength, she'd help heal the rift between them, bring the group together again.

He tried to catch her eye to thank her as she walked back to her spot in front of the fire. As if she could feel him staring at her, she looked over to him, cocking her head in that little way she had.

_Okay?_, she seemed to be asking. He nodded slightly, and saw her lips quirk in a smile. Before she could look away, he smiled back, bigger than he had intended. He just couldn't help himself.

**A/N. Thank you so much for the feedback so far! And thank you to the guest reviewers, I wish you had accounts so I could respond personally!**


	12. Chapter 12

**The First Time He Watched Her Shoot**

It felt like they were back in high school again. Literally. Rick had decided the group needed practice shooting and guided them to a little rural high school that they had come across on the road.

It was just a small town school, but in small town Georgia, football was King, or _had been_ at least. The little football stadium would have had pride of place in a town five times the size of the one where it was located. The stadium was enclosed by walls and had seats rising at least fifty feet up. If the sound of the guns drew Walkers (and Rick thought the stadium would muffle or confuse the direction of the noise), the dead could only get in through the one main entrance, which they had barricaded. They could line up on the field and practice, in as much safety as could be hoped for an hour or two.

The tackle dummies the football team had used for practice were still on the field. Rick positioned the dummies, then lined the group up on the 50-yard line. Then he carefully doled out the weapons and ammunition that they had gathered over the past few months. Pistols and handguns down the line to each, until he got to her. He handed her the only gun left, a rifle.

She held it awkwardly, feeling the heavy and unfamiliar weight in her hands. She wore the knife that _he _had given her for Christmas every day and even had had occasion to use it once or twice. But the gun was new. She had never shot a gun before, much less a rifle. She hadn't ever had any experience with guns or shooting, despite seeing her daddy with one for hunting often as not when she was younger.

Rick moved down the line, helping each person sight and target the dummies and take their shots. This had been Shane's job back at the farm, but she reckoned that Rick was just as good a teacher, despite the fact that he kept mentioning that he hadn't been certified as an instructor. _Like Shane, _went the unspoken comparison, and she wondered if she was the only one who heard it.

She waited for Rick to come down the line to her and demonstrate. While she waited, she stood quietly and observed the others.

If they were still in high school, Rick would definitely have been quarterback of the football team. Totally in charge, big man on campus. Lori would have been head cheerleader, she decided. Fierce and assertive, tall and beautiful, she was the object of all the guys' attention, positive or negative.

Maggie would be some star athlete - maybe the captain of the volleyball team. She was tough and fit and strong, and she seemed to have adapted to this life like she was born to it.

Hershel would have been the principal, she thought; Glenn the head of the Chess Club. T-dog the coolest guy at school. Beth? Obviously the Homecoming Queen. Sweet and little but as pretty as a picture. Everyone loved her and tried to protect her.

And Daryl. He leaned back on a bench on the sidelines, watching them all. She knew that he would be there if Rick needed him, but he was letting Rick run the show. Cool and calm in his leather jacket, slouched backwards on the bench as if he was above it all. If it had been high school, he'd have been the loner, the aloof bad boy that the good girls (like she had been) covertly looked at, but never spoke to.

She shook her head ruefully. She was being silly, but the whole situation was silly. Standing here in the middle of a _football_ field, taking aim with their guns at tackle dummies at the end of the world.

Rick finally made his way down the line of the group, all aiming and shooting, and reached her. He regarded her carefully, positioning her arms and legs just so in the correct stance. Then he wrapped his arms around her shoulders to help teach her how to hold the rifle correctly.

She felt a flush of embarrassment. It had been awkward with Rick these past few months. She knew that everything wasn't really his fault, but it had been almost a relief to have someone to blame. For Sophia, for the reasons they left the farm, for the pain that she knew Lori felt, and for making it so she and Daryl had lost their connection and were strangers to each other. None of it was really his fault, she knew that, but it was just easier to have someone to focus on, to blame.

Then Daryl had come to her, a couple weeks before. She had been surprised, then annoyed, when it seemed that he meant to blame Lori for the all the problems the group had. It wasn't her friend's fault, she knew that. Lori was scared and confused, and practically begging for Rick to look at her out of anything other than just duty. She knew Daryl didn't understand that. Or didn't want to.

But he hadn't dwelled on that point, just had pressed on. And what he had said had made her think. It must be hard on Rick too. To have the burden of the whole group on his shoulders. More importantly, it had seemed like Daryl was asking for her help, without specifically saying so. Looking at him across the fire, while he had stared so earnestly at her, she knew that after everything he had done for her, she had to help him. She'd try to reach out to Rick. Even if it meant giving up the focus of all her hurt and anger.

So that night, she had sighed, steeled herself, and gone to thank Rick. And hugged him. She knew that Lori had considered it something like a betrayal, but she didn't mean to hurt her friend. He had been right, they had to stick together. And if reaching out to Rick would make that happen, she was prepared to do it.

But now she was standing here and Rick was practically hugging her, his body pressed against her back, his arms around her. When she had decided to help him, she hadn't meant to sign up for this. She turned her head to see Daryl's reaction. He was still slouched unmoving on the bench, but he seemed amused as he looked at her, and she rolled her eyes at him before turning back to face the target. This was all his fault.

She followed Rick's whispered instructions in her ear and took careful aim, squeezing the trigger. The rifle exploded backwards against her shoulder, hurting her. The shot was obviously far wide. She darted a gaze over to where he sat on the bench. He looked like he was holding back laughter. She scowled at him.

"That's a good first try, Carol," Rick said encouragingly near her ear. "Just try again."

She took another shot. She could tell from Rick's wince beside her that she had missed by a mile again. She tried again and again. Each time seemed worse than the last. She kept trying, and kept failing.

Her arms ached from holding the gun up. Her shoulder burned from the kickback. She was so frustrated that she wanted to cry. In fact, she knew that she was about to cry. Tears burned in the corners of her eyes, and she felt a lump growing in her throat.

She was horrible at this. All down the line, the others seemed to be picking it up, but she was horrible. It was so embarrassing. She wanted to be _strong_, to be able to protect the group. And it was hopeless. She'd never be good at this, never be good at anything more than cooking and cleaning and mending. But anyone could do those things. And they weren't even important things. Not before, and definitely not now. What was her purpose or _worth_ in the group if she couldn't even keep them safe?

The lump in her throat was growing, and she dropped her head to hide her tears, lowering the rifle. Rick patted her awkwardly on the shoulder. "Keep it up, Carol, you just need to practice." He moved back up the line to stand silently behind Lori.

She just stood there feeling worthless. She didn't want to look over to him, but felt she had to. Just to see his face. She forced herself to look at him and see what he thought of her failure.

He hadn't moved from his position on the sidelines, but he was staring at her intently, all the laughter gone from his face. He didn't stand up, didn't come over to take over or try to demonstrate. But he seemed focused solely on her while the rest of the group continued to fire.

She shook her head at him. _I can't do this. _She thought that she would see him acknowledge this clear, unmistakeable fact. But he didn't. He just nodded to her firmly, encouragingly. Then she saw him pantomime taking a deep breath and watched his lips move. _Just relax_, he mouthed. He nodded again. _Try again_.

She sighed, defeated. But she looked back at the target. This was ridiculous. If any member of the group's safety ever depended on her shooting ability, they'd be in a world of hurt. But she knew that he was still watching her, and she couldn't let him see her give up. Even if it was hopeless.

She lifted the rifle again and took a deep breath, mimicking what he had just showed her. Then she relaxed while pressing the gun against her shoulder firmly, aimed carefully, and took the shot.

She hit the dummy at its feet. It was a horrible shot. Clearly wouldn't ever stop any Walker, unless it could somehow die from a wound in the foot. Still, she had hit the target, even if it was five feet lower than she intended!

She looked over at him in triumph to see if he had noticed. She thought he might have looked away to watch the others, dismissing her in her failure. After all, why would he care how she had done? But he hadn't looked away, and he wasn't focused on anyone else. Just on her. He was grinning at her, and nodding his head. _Just like that_, he seemed to be saying.

She felt like cheering. She lifted the rifle to try again.

In the coming weeks, the group would continue to practice, whenever they could find the space or time, and whenever they could spare the ammo. And she became a pretty good shot. Oh, not anything like Andrea had been, and not as good as Rick or Daryl or even Carl. But still, able to hold her own.

And every time she held the rifle against her shoulder, she remembered that first time, and the encouragement in his eyes. And she'd take a deep breath and see his face smiling in her mind's eye. Then she aimed, and pulled the trigger, and shot to kill.


	13. Chapter 13

**The First Time He Had Watch With Her**

Of all the crappy places they'd had to hole up since the farm, he reckoned the storage units were the worst. Forty little units, set out in four rows of ten each. It could have been a goldmine of supplies. But they hadn't been well-maintained. Most of them were leaking or had been ransacked, and there wasn't nothing in the way of supplies like they had hoped. Just old musty boxes of clothes and toys and kitchen crap that they had no use for. The few ones that were usable for shelter were cramped as hell, and the smell was horrible.

But dark had come while they were out on the road. And it was the tail end of winter and bitterly cold. Lori was getting weaker. She had almost collapsed against one of the cars when they had stopped to try to plan out the route.

It was the closest place they could find for the night. So they had stopped.

Still, it was a shithole. And not secure by any means. There was no fence, nothing to protect them while they slept, other than breaking into the few units still secured and then pulling down the rickety metal doors. It was too risky to be out in the open with a fire burning.

Given the danger, Rick had decided that they should take watch in twos, each pair on for three hours. Rick and T-dog, Glenn and Maggie, and him and her. She had nodded seriously at Rick when he made the suggestion and volunteered immediately to take first watch. He could tell from her face that she was proud to be included with those taking watch. She carried the rifle almost all the time now, slung carefully around her back. Once, when she had seen him staring at it, she had answered his unspoken question solemnly and told him that she had to get used to carrying it.

They had climbed up on the roof of one of the units together to survey the area. He was trying to gather his thoughts. He looked down at her a little helplessly. He'd never had watch with another person before, much less _her_. If he had been alone, he would have alternated patrolling around the outskirts with sitting up on the roof of the unit to watch the wider area.

He tried to take charge. "Okay, I'll patrol around the units, you stay up here and be coverin' me."

He meant to spend the next three hours walking the perimeter while she stayed safe up on the roof, "covering" him. But, as always, she seemed to understand what he meant without him saying it. He watched her shoulders square. "Okay, you do a patrol and then come back up to the roof. Then I'll do a patrol while you stay up on the roof covering _me_."

Good Lord. She was just so damn _stubborn_. If she seriously thought that he was gonna sit up on the roof while she walked around in the dark alone without him, she was freaking crazy. He started to protest, and then saw it was useless. She was crossing her arms and opening her mouth to argue.

He interrupted her instead. "A'ight, fine, we'll _both _watch from the roof. Happy now?," he huffed to her. She smiled and nodded.

He sat down cross-legged, bow in his hand to face out to the south. He expected her to sit at the opposite end of the roof, but she surprised him. She mimicked his position, but sat down right behind him facing the opposite direction, scooting back until the small of her back just barely touched his.

"What're you doin'?" he said without looking back.

He heard her calm voice behind him. "This way, we can lean against each other but see the whole area."

Well, he wasn't going to be doing any _leaning_. Watch was serious business. Still, their positions made sense. This way, sitting together back to back at the center of the roof, they could see out at all 360 degrees around them. If something was coming from any direction, one of them would see it.

The wind continued to blow. It seemed colder than ever. They sat quietly in silence. Well, this wasn't that bad. Could get used to it, maybe. Besides, it was warmer with her sitting so close.

"So what was your favorite sport before all this," he heard her ask behind him. He almost jumped at the sound.

"My favorite sport? You serious?"

"Yes, seriously. We have three hours up here. Are you just planning to sit the whole time and look at the ground?"

Well, yes. That's exactly what he had been planning. But it seemed rude not to respond, so he sighed heavily, knowing she could feel it from her position pressed up behind him.

"Football, I guess."

"Oh, really? How come? Did you play in high school?"

"No."

"Okay, well what kind of music did you like?"

"Whatevers on the radio, I guess."

He felt her sigh, then try again. He knew he was horrible at this. After a few more questions, she must have realized that he was crap at conversation, and she fell silent. He felt like a failure, but he just wasn't sure what exactly she wanted. And he was afraid of saying the wrong thing.

So she started to talk quietly, tell stories. She wasn't yapping really, and she didn't talk the whole time. Easy silence would pass by for a few minutes, then she would be telling some funny little story. Didn't seem to mind that he wasn't responding.

She didn't mention anything personal-like. She didn't once talk about Sophia or that asshole she was married to. Still, he felt like he _knew _her from the stories she told. She was funny and smart and kind. All things he had figured out on his own, but hearing her talk just reaffirmed it. It was _nice_, sitting there listening to her. He heard Merle's voice in his head telling him he was a pussy, just sitting and listening to a woman talk like they were _friends _or something without trying nothing with her. But, he didn't care. It was nice.

He was listening intently as his eyes swept the ground, while she told about the first time she went fishing with her daddy as a little girl and threw all the worms overboard to "save" them. He felt himself smile, picturing the scene. He wanted to hear the end, how her daddy had reacted when she had done it (he knew good and well how his own would have handled the situation), when she stopped abruptly.

"Guess I'm being annoying. All these stories. I've just never been on watch before."

He didn't want her to stop. "Hell, tell all the damn stories you want."

He felt her back shake against his with her laugh. He wasn't sure when it happened but they were sitting closer. He could feel the length of her against him. She wasn't leaning on him, exactly. There was just a solid warmth behind him. He could feel the movements of her body as she talked.

"Okay, but I feel like Scheherazade over here. One wrong move and I'm done for. Have you heard of her?"

No, he hadn't. He tensed and felt himself lean forward away from her, losing the contact of their bodies against each other. Likely this was some college thing that the others would know but not him. He didn't want to be quizzed on what he knew and didn't know and how he knew it or why he didn't and have to say that he didn't know nothing but what he learned in high school, what Merle and his daddy had taught him, and what he had learned on his own when the two of them were off God knows where.

She didn't seem to notice his reaction though. She just scooted back slightly against him until they were touching again and laughed.

"Not surprising, why should you? It's just an old story, something I used to tell Soph…well, I mean, something like a bedtime story. Just a story."

He felt himself relax and lean back slightly when he realized that she wasn't laughing at him.

"She was a princess. Forced to marry an evil king who had killed each of his previous wives. So, every night, she would start to tell some fascinating story. Always making sure that she ended the story on a cliffhanger right at dawn. The next night, she'd finish the story and start another. He ended up keeping her alive for 1,001 nights, just so he could hear the end of the stories."

She leaned her head back against him as she talked, the back of her head resting against the back of his neck. Her hair tickled his neck a little, but he wouldn't have moved away for nothing.

"Well, I ain't plannin' on killin' you if you tell a boring story, if that's what you're worried about."

She laughed. And he just kept sitting there watching the trees and the ground and listening to her voice.

Watch went on.

He was listening to her tell a funny little story about coming upon a lone Walker in the woods and missing when she tried to stab it in the face, cutting off its ear instead. Her voice was still quiet, but animated and laughing. His back felt toasty warm pressed against hers, and he was thinking about...…then suddenly, what she was saying penetrated his head. _Wait a damn minute, _what_ now? _She wasn't talking about fighting no Walker months earlier, before he had been with her. She was talking about something that must have happened last week, when he had been gone overnight on a hunt alone.

He tensed and turned his body to see her face. She stopped talking when she felt him move and turned as well to look at him quizically. Their faces were inches apart. He was angry as hell. "You sayin' that you were out alone again? Just you? What the hell? Where was Rick?"

"Carol? You up there?" He stopped in mid-scold, hearing Glenn's voice call up from the ground below.

Immediately, she scooted to her knees and crawled over the roof to peek down at Glenn. Now all he could see of her was her little backside as she leaned down to listen to Glenn. He found himself staring and heard Merle's appreciative drawl in his head. _Christ, Brother, this is more like it! _He looked away hurriedly.

She finished whispering to Glenn and turned back to him. "Hershel wants to examine Lori, thought it'd be a good idea if I sat in to observe. Glenn says he and Maggie will be up in a few minutes to relieve you. You okay alone?"

He snorted and nodded shortly. Be better off alone anyhows. She just grinned at him, seemingly unfazed at his anger from seconds before, and swung her feet over the side of the roof to climb down the ladder, positioning the rifle carefully around her back as she did. His last glimpse of her was her face smiling up at him before she dropped down out of sight.

He spent the remaining twenty minutes of watch alone. He should have been happy, it was what he had wanted. And he had enough to think about (chiefly how he was going to have to have a serious talk with Rick as soon as he was done about letting her just wander off alone when he wasn't there). But somehow those few minutes seemed to drag on twice as long as the hours before. It just felt too quiet for some reason. Besides, his back was cold.


	14. Chapter 14

**The First Time She Flirted With Him**

When she went out on runs now, it was always with him. She didn't know for sure if he and Rick had worked that out between them, but she had a pretty good idea that was what had happened. For some reason, he seemed fixated on her not being out alone or without him. Sometimes, she would look up as she moved around camp to see him watching her intently, as though he were afraid that she was about to wander off and get herself killed the second she was out of his sight.

Probably he was worried that he would have to be the one to run in and save her in her stupidity. It had annoyed her at first. She had thought that he treated her that way because she was a woman. Before all of this, she doubted that he had seen many women with a weapon or had to count on one to watch his back in a fight. But she quickly realized that wasn't it. He didn't act the same around Beth or Maggie or Lori (certainly not Lori!).

Still, she hadn't understood his behavior. The first few times that she had noticed it, she wanted to stop what she was doing and yell across camp at him that she could take care of herself _too_, just like the others, that she wasn't a useless burden like he seemed to think.

But the more that they went out on runs together alone and the more times they were on watch alone together, she began to relax. When they were together, he didn't treat her like she was useless. He listened to her. She came to realize that he actually respected her, thought her capable, wanted her with him to guard his back.

It was especially apparent when they were out on runs. He didn't coddle her, didn't suggest that she wait alone by the bike while he scouted out in front. As long as she was close to him, he treated her like she thought he would have treated any other _capable_ member of the group. And although she hadn't had any experience going out on runs with anyone else, she reckoned that they were a good team. They could move together without speaking. She seemed to understand what he planned without any words between them.

She finally realized that for whatever reason, he just seemed to prefer when she was close. So she accepted that and didn't question it. There were enough things to worry on nowadays.

Rick wanted to check out a little town they'd found on the map. It was far enough back from the interstate that it might not have seen much action. Might be deserted enough to spend a night or two and refill up on supplies. Rick decided the two of them should ride in on the bike and scout it out while the rest of the group waited hidden off the road. They would report back if it was safe, and the rest of the group could follow them in.

They got to the town and jumped off the bike. She followed him carefully as he led the way on foot through the streets. All was well until they had rounded a corner onto the main drag through the town. The street was flooded with Walkers, one of the biggest herds she had ever seen.

He backed up immediately, putting his arm around her waist to pull her around the corner. But as they tried to make it back to the bike, they saw that the herd had overtaken their path to retreat.

He reacted swiftly, stepping up to the nearest building and kicking in the door, pulling her with him before jamming the door closed again with his shoulder.

It was a little pizza parlor. Or had been at least. Cheesy Italian murals on the walls, checkered tablecloths, the works. Whoever had been there though had tried to make a last stand of some sort. All the tables were stacked up at the windows at the front. The windows themselves were blacked out with some sort of paint.

As soon as they were inside, he moved quickly, pulling one of the tables over to block the front door, then dragging another over to reinforce the barricade. She helped him, and they worked together without any need to talk. She could hear the herd moving outside, but the Walkers didn't seem to realize where they had gone.

Still, there were dozens of them outside. She could hear their groans and shuffles as they bumped into the door and dragged themselves along the street in front.

She wondered where the people who must have holed up inside would have gone. Or why they would have left this little safe place. But it quickly became apparent. There was no water, but more importantly, no _food_ left inside. Whoever had been there must had been driven out of safety to search for something to survive on.

They were supposed to meet up with the group again at dusk to report. But clearly they weren't going to make the meet-up point tonight.

That was okay, the group had worked out contingency plans on top of contingency plans for just this type of situation. If they weren't back by dusk, the group was to find the safest shelter they could for the night, then wait for them again at the meeting place at dawn.

She settled in for a long night.

She got to work while he checked out the back to make sure it was secure too. She pulled out granola bars and a jar of peanut butter and bottles of water from her pack. She didn't want to weaken the barricade by moving one of the tables for them to eat on so she contented herself with pulling down one of the tablecloths and spreading it on the floor. She found a couple of those garish red candles these types of places seemed to love and lit them, setting them on the tablecloth on the floor. Who knows how long they'd be holed up here. She had to save the batteries from their flashlights for as long as possible.

She sat back on her heels to survey her work. Pretty nice, if she did say so herself. Kind of cheery actually. It would do for the night.

He had wandered back in, moving to double-check the doors and windows to make sure they were secure. "Well?" she called to his back to get his attention. "What do you think, nice, right?"

He looked back to see the tablecloth spread out, the food arranged, and the candles twinkling merrily.

"Yeah," he said absently over his shoulder as he continued to patrol the room, "Great. Real romantic."

She wondered if he realized what he had just said. He had. He froze, his back to her. She knew he didn't mean anything by it, of course. How could he. Just look at him and then just look at her. She wondered if he realized how valuable someone like him was in this world. All the stupid social trappings and pointless liberal arts education that had been so important before were nothing now. Only the strong would survive, and he was strong. Strong and capable and totally self-sufficient.

And frankly? Beautiful. She watched him all the time at camp without meaning to, without wanting to. Beneath the ever-present layer of dirt and scruff, he was so beautiful despite it all, or maybe because of it, that it always hurt a little to look at him.

She had a pretty good idea how this all was going to end up. Sooner or later, the group would stop running. They had to. They couldn't run forever. They'd find a place to settle down. And it was only inevitable that others would join them. Rick was cautious to the point of paranoia about other survivors, and so far, the group had avoided the other living like, well, like the plague.

But that could only last for so long. Sooner or later, their group would grow. And she could see very clearly what would happen. A man like him? As strong as he was? As important? And looking the way that he did? He'd find someone as beautiful and as strong as he was. And _younger_, obviously. It was only a matter of time.

But knowing all that didn't mean she didn't watch him whenever she could. Watching him made her happy somehow. Even though she knew that someone like him would never be watching someone like her. He was still her friend, and she hoped that he always would be, no matter what happened later on.

So she was determined that he shouldn't be embarrassed for what was only an offhand remark, after all.

She tried to make it easier for him, keep the mood light. "Yep, real romantic. A great place for a first _date," _she teased.

He turned finally and looked down at her. She smiled up at him, to show that she knew he hadn't meant anything by it. The moment still felt tense, awkward, so she picked up a bottle of water and waggled it at him. "Here, come on," she said, patting the tablecloth beside her. "Let's eat."

After they had eaten, they sat for awhile in silence. She was getting sleepy. It was time to turn in.

It didn't seem like there was really any need for one of them to stay up for watch. They were secure in here and just needed to wait out the night. But he seemed determined to wait up. He sat away from her against the wall with his bow in his hand, not meeting her eyes, fixated on checking each of the bolts.

She sighed. It would be useless to argue with him that they trade off watches (watches that weren't even necessary!). So she plumped up her pack to use as a pillow, and pulled one of the tablecloths over her as a blanket. It was horribly uncomfortable, but she would make do.

Then she heard him. "Come over here, if you want. Not goin' to get any sleep like that."

She rolled over to look at him curiously in the candlelight. He was still slouched against the wall, but staring over at her with what almost looked like concern. "Here, come on." He patted his leg, indicating that she should use it as a pillow. Well. This was a little strange. But she was touched by the gesture, and most of all, so very very tired. She decided not to overthink it. They were friends, right? She scooted across the floor and curled up next to him, gingerly resting her head against his leg.

She could feel the warmth of his leg through his jeans and smell the scent of his body. She laid there awkwardly wondering if she could possibly fall asleep like this. He must have felt as awkward as she did. He couldn't seem to figure out where to put his hands. She felt one hand lightly brush her head as he rearranged himself.

She tried to make it easier for him again. "Well, if I didn't know better, I would think you were trying to take advantage of me."

For a second, she thought she had gone too far. But then his breath came out in a huff, and she knew it was okay. She could hear the amusement in his voice as he ordered gruffly, "Stop. Go to sleep."

She closed her eyes.

She wasn't sure how much time had passed but suddenly she opened her eyes, disoriented. It was almost pitch black, only one last lit candle guttering softly on the tablecloth. Something had changed. It must have jolted her awake. Was she alone?

But no, she wasn't alone. She was still curled up, head still resting on his leg as he leaned up against the wall. He was still there, warm and solid, against her.

She glanced up without moving, but she couldn't see his face. He must have dozed off though. He didn't move, and his breathing was soft and deep. She realized suddenly what had been so strange and why she had woken up. His left hand was curled around the bow, but his right hand was resting warmly against her head, buried in her hair.

She closed her eyes again, content to drift back to sleep feeling his leg under her cheek and the heavy weight of his hand in her hair. It was okay. For now, they were safe. And together.


	15. Chapter 15

**The First Time He Realized He Loved Her**

They rode together all the time now. It was just accepted that when they moved, she was with him, and he was with her. When he did ride alone, to scout out ahead for the group, he felt almost anxious. He missed the weight of her body behind him, her breasts pressing against his back and her breath against his neck. He missed how she would curl her hands around his waist and how sometimes, when it was cold, her fingers would slip up between his shirt and his belt and he would feel them against his bare skin.

They found the prison that morning. He listened intently while Rick laid out the plan. It made sense. It could be a gold mine for them. A place to hole up for Lori to have the baby. A secure base to live and be safe while they scouted out at the area around them for supplies.

Rick directed the two of them to the closest tower with Carl and Hershel in the other while the rest were on the ground to draw the Walkers to them. He didn't question that Rick put them together. Hell, he had made it clear enough to Rick in the past few months that he wanted her to be close to him. And there weren't no other member of the group better that he would have wanted with him up on the tower to shoot and to fight.

She was worried though, he could tell. She held the rifle with experience, gripping it the way Rick had taught her, pushed firmly against her shoulder. But her face was anxious, and he watched her bite her lip while they waited for Lori to pull the doors open below them for Rick to run across the yard. She looked so worried, he just couldn't stand it. He wanted to say something to reassure her, to move over to stand closer beside her.

Then she looked over at him and caught him staring. And he watched her smile while her jaw tightened, and she seemed to take a deep breath. Then she looked away from him, sighting the walkers in the yard determinedly through the scope. He cursed himself for staring at her instead of concentrating on what the hell they were up here to do, namely, cover Rick while he made a suicide run across the yard to try to close the gate and prevent any more Walkers from flooding in.

He heard the gate scrape open and forced himself to forget that she was standing there next to him. Rick needed him, and she was safe up here with him, after all. It was time to focus on the yard, to make Rick's run as safe as possible. He aimed and shot, again and again.

He didn't stop registering her, of course. He felt every shot that she took. He heard her curse slightly when she shot too low at first. He didn't dare look over, to break his concentration on covering Rick, but he knew that she corrected her sight, and he saw from his peripheral vision that she took down Walker after Walker after the slow start. He was so proud of her that it was ridiculous.

They watched as Rick secured the door to the courtyard and hurried inside the other tower. Then they saw him reappear at the top of the far tower.

He was relieved. He yelled to the others to light it up. The next few minutes were a roar of shooting as they shot again and again, the others, him, her. Finally, it was over. The last Walker had fallen, and there were no more standing in the yard.

She lowered her rifle and turned towards him in triumph. He found himself moving closer to her until he stood right before her. Her eyes were sparkling. He just looked down and stared at her, finding himself grinning in return. They had done it.

Then she moved in a blur. She slung the rifle around her back and leaped on him. He froze, surprised. She usually seemed so careful in how she touched him, as though she was afraid he would push her away or hit her or something (the thought that she might worry that he would just about killed him). But now her arms were winding around him and he could feel her body shake as she laughed against his chest while her face was pressed against his neck. He stopped thinking about it. All he wanted to do, and did, was wrap his arms around her too. To _share_ this moment with her. _Christ, little brother_, he heard Merle say in disgust. But he didn't care.

She was laughing and half-sobbing. He could feel her trembling while her breath came out hot and wet against his neck. He held her as tightly as he could without hurting her, burying his face against the top of her head.

Then she pulled back and looked up at him, and he saw tears in the corners of her eyes. He felt lost in her eyes, just drinking in how happy she was and how glad he was to see it. He wasn't sure how long the moment lasted, all he knew was that it ended way too soon.

Suddenly, she broke away from him and turned to dash down the stairs. He followed her hurriedly, concerned, as always, that she would get too far away. They reached the bottom of the tower, and she darted away from him, running to be with the rest of the group. He tried to call out, to give her a well-earned compliment on her shooting, but mostly just to get her to stop and come back to him.

She glanced back at the compliment and laughed, her face shining. She was so beautiful and alive in that moment that he knew he was staring, but he couldn't look away. He was so flustered that he ended up patting Lori awkwardly as he passed her, and he reckoned it was the first time that he and Lori Grimes had ever touched each other.

Then he watched her skip through the yard, calling and laughing to the others, infecting them with her enthusiasm and joy. And all he could do was just watch her. That's when he realized it. That's when he knew. He loved her. As much as he had ever loved anyone in his life, as much as he was or would ever be capable of loving anyone. The realization almost floored him.

That night, he volunteered for watch on the overturned prison bus, desperate to get away from the rest of them to gather his thoughts. To regroup. But she didn't leave him alone. She sought him out, the way she always did. He knew he couldn't avoid her without her getting suspicious. So he helped her climb up to the top of the bus and tried to talk to her as normal, as if he hadn't just had a realization that shook everything he was.

She talked to him in that easy way they had established together. But she was hurt, he noticed that instantly. Without thinking, he reached out. Pulled her closer and tried to massage her shoulder. He was only thinking of easing her pain, but when he saw her smile and look away, it felt awkward suddenly. Like he had overstepped. The moment seemed to linger on, and he was embarrassed. She came up to give him food, make sure he was okay, to _mother _him, just like she would have done with any of them. And here he was practically molesting her.

She seemed to register his discomfort though, the way she always did. And she made a joke, smiling impishly up at him the way she always did. He knew she didn't mean nothing by the remark. And he wished so much that he could joke back with her, to _flirt_, to be easy and confident with her the way Merle would have been. But he was afraid that he would say something to embarrass her, to ruin it between them. So instead, he heard himself tell her gruffly to stop, and he just followed her back down and over to the group.

He stood close by her though while they listened to Beth and Maggie sing, and he wished so much that he could be someone different, like _Merle_, someone who could make her look at him.

The next morning, they took the yard and secured one of the cell blocks. After it was secure, the group filed in, assessing their new home. He could see that they were all tentatively figuring out sleeping arrangements, so he forestalled any conversation about where _he _would be sleeping by calling the perch. He hated himself for wanting it, but he thought that maybe she would say that she would come and sleep up there too. Not with him, of course. But maybe next to him in a cell. Or at least near him. But she didn't. She didn't even look up when he walked to the second level, and he watched as she and Lori picked out a cell to share together. Well, of course. What did he expect.

That night, he laid on his blanket in the perch staring up at the ceiling. There was no use to any of these thoughts. It was hopeless, he knew that. A woman like her, with her class and upbringing and education, she wouldn't never be wanting white trash like him. She might stay close and smile and tease gently, but that's just who she was. He couldn't let himself think he meant anything more to her than any of the others. She was good to everyone. Her reaching out didn't mean he was nothing special.


	16. Chapter 16

**The First Time She Slept With Him At The Prison**

She was just so worried about Lori. She reckoned that they must have reached her friend's due date, if not blown past it. Lori hurt all the time now, she could tell. Her back ached, her feet were swollen, and she was having Braxton Hicks contractions, although she tried to hide it from the others, especially Rick. But she could tell. Not just because she had gone through what Lori was going through, but because she was so focused on her now. So unrelentingly worried about what would happen if they couldn't find a safe place for Lori to have the baby.

She knew that she was focusing on Lori so much to avoid focusing on the danger that they were all in. They had never tried to engage with the dead before like they were doing now. For months, they had been on the run. Of course, the group had fought the dead when they came upon them. But they had never _rushed out_ to meet them, to run towards them to fight. And now they were. And all because they had found the prison.

They had taken the prison yard, and she thought they might relax for a little while. But Rick wanted to push forward, into the prison itself. She understood why. He wanted to get Lori inside, so she would have a safe place for when the baby came.

But it just felt so reckless, so _sudden. _She stood by Lori with Beth and Carl and Hershel, while the five of them watched the others fan out across the prison courtyard. She couldn't tear her eyes away from him. She moved restlessly, back and forth, trying to find the best angle to see him. She watched with her heart in her throat as he rushed forward at Walker after Walker. She was worried about all of them, of course she was, but she couldn't stop herself from staring just at him, cursing him as he seemed to take the most risks to clear the courtyard for them all.

Finally, it was done, and she was weak with relief. They all made their way into the cell block to see their new "home." She tried to follow him in, to try to engage him, but he was moving far away from her, not even looking back as he called back to Rick that he would sleep in the perch.

Well. What did she expect. The two of them had gotten into the habit of setting up their bedrolls side by side on the road. Never touching, never too close, but always together. But that was on the road. This was different. So instead she followed Lori into one of the cells. It was better this way, anyways. She needed to be close to Lori in case her friend needed her.

That afternoon, she waited while half the group went to scour the basement cells at the prison. She was so worried that she felt like she was on fire. The thought of him down there, the fear that something would happen to him.

Then suddenly, the rest of the group were all screaming back into the cell block. The noise was deafening. She had been paralyzed, so scared that he had been hurt, been _bit_, that when she finally registered that it was actually Hershel who was injured, for a split second, she had been relieved. Immediately, she hated herself for that shameful thought and moved without thinking into action. She needed to use everything Hershel had taught her to help stem the bleeding and try desperately to help him without any of the supplies or skills that Hershel really needed.

A couple hours later, when Hershel had stabilized somewhat, she was struck again with fear. If Hershel could actually die (and she prayed with everything she had that God would spare them of that), there would be no one to help Lori deliver but her. The thought gnawed and gnawed at her until she knew she had to do something, to try something, anything.

She called Glenn over and drew him outside, outlining her plan. He was reluctant, but he helped her. They targeted a female Walker, tall and thin like Lori, and Glenn drew the others away while she took the Walker down. Once they had dragged the Walker into the yard, she sent Glenn back in to watch over Hershel and sit with Maggie and Beth.

The female Walker, so alike Lori in height and physique, lay spread-eagled on the ground before her. She sank down and pulled out her knife, then sat back on her heels feeling helpless. She just wasn't sure how to begin. She'd had a Caesarian with Sophia, but having been through one and having to _try _one were about the two furthest things apart that she could possibly imagine.

She took a deep breath and forced herself to put the knife to the Walker's abdomen. Her first cut was so shallow that it barely drew blood. But the blood that did come forth, thick and red-black and congealed, was so horrifying that she gagged. She felt the bile rise in her throat and she fought the urge to vomit. She _had _to do this. She had to try for Lori. She pushed the knife against the Walker's belly again, harder this time.

She literally had no idea what she was doing. She just kept pushing the knife a little deeper with each cut. But then, she realized, she could almost see it. The folds of skin and muscles parting to show her the walls of the uterus laying beneath. She felt a rush of pure excitement. Could she really actually do this? If the time came, could she maybe help Lori deliver the baby without hurting either of them?

She was so lost in her work that she didn't hear him until he was almost on top of her. Then, at the sound of his heavy bootsteps and angry voice nearly right above her, her concentration broke. She started backwards, her knife slipping against the Walker and cutting deeper than she had intended.

"Christ, Carol!" He bit out the words at her. She looked up, surprised at his tone, to see that he was seething as he looked down at her. "Why the hell you out here alone? What the fuck? Don't you realize what could be out here?"

She wanted to make him understand but she was still half-lost in what she had been doing. Actually seeing the knife cut through the flesh until she could see where Lori's baby would be, if she actually had to go through with this. She looked back down at the body and bent over it again, drawing away from him. "Lori might need a C-section," she said absently up at him.

He didn't let her tune him out. His voice was so angry. "The hell? You think you some kind of doctor now? This ain't worth your life."

He sounded so dismissive of her and so angry with her that suddenly she was angry in return. He was only saying what she was thinking already, but she was furious with him for voicing the thoughts that she had been trying to push down. Lori might _need _this. And goddamn it, she was doing that the best she could. And goddamn him for running out here like she was helpless when she was surrounded by heavy gates and had the own damn knife that _he _had given her for protection.

She jumped up and got in his face. "What isn't? What isn't worth my life? Lori? Why? Because she's carrying 'Little Shane'? Is that it? You'd just be happer if she was gone?"

He recoiled as if she had struck him, and her sudden anger faded to be replaced by shame. That she had thrown the little quip he made that first night in the prison yard back in his face as though it were proof that he wanted harm to come to Lori. She knew he didn't give a damn about who the baby's father was. She knew that he looked out for Lori even if their, well, _personalities, _didn't exactly mesh. She knew that he would risk his life for Lori's safety, and had, and would continue to. It was a cheap shot, and she was ashamed to have thrown it at him.

She thought that he would stalk off, the way he always had before when they had argued. But he didn't. He didn't even move away. He just stood there and stared down at her accusingly with the hurt and anger still in his face. And even when she turned away and kneeled back down to try again to dissect the Walker with all her fumbling, he didn't leave. Just stood near her and watched over her, without saying a word. When she finally finished, defeated at everything she didn't know, he just waited til she got up and trudged back to the cell block. She felt him following closely behind.

That night, she laid in the top bunk listening to the sound of Lori sleeping below her. She needed to see him. So she left the cell and crept up quietly to the perch where he had set up his stuff. She knew that he had to be awake. She had heard him come off of watch from the guard tower not more than ten minutes before.

She reached the perch. The moonlight was faint through the high windows but she could see him lying there on his bedroll. His head was resting on his pack and his eyes were open and trained on her. She knew that he had heard her creep up the stairs. He was waiting to see what she would do.

She watched him watch her walk in. She slipped closer and hovered above him uncertainly. She'd leave if he wanted her to. She just waited for a sign from him. Finally, he closed his eyes and seemed to sigh. Eyes closed, he patted the floor beside him. It was the only invitation that she needed. She sank down to her knees next to him, then laid down and curled up in a ball.

She rested her head on his stomach tentatively. She thought that he might push her away or ask her what the hell she thought she was doing, but he didn't. Instead, he just put his hand against her neck. It felt like déjà vu. Like the time they had been caught together in the little town and had had to hole up together for the night. That night, she had awoken to feel his hand in her hair. When she woke up the next morning, he had been awake with his arms crossed along his chest and she had wondered almost if she had dreamed it.

But this was no dream. He ran his hand up her neck, then she felt his fingers move through her hair. It was so comforting. She felt safer than she had in years.

"I'm sorry. I'm just so scared. About Lori," she whispered. _And about you_, she added silently. He didn't speak for awhile, just continued to run his hand up through her hair, then down her neck, the back of his fingers resting, then pressing against her skin as they moved up and back.

"I know," she finally heard him say. "But I just need you to stay safe."

She smiled and closed her eyes and let herself _feel _safe, even if just for this moment. She felt herself drifting off to sleep. Maybe it really would all be okay. Maybe this could be their new home for the years to come. Hershel could recover. Lori could have the baby without any problem. They'd all of them stay safe together here and grow crops and make a home. It was such a lovely thought.


	17. Chapter 17

**The First Time He Hoped and Prayed**

Sex, he understood. Before, it was all a familiar routine. A long week at work, mind screaming with the built-up stress of the week and money troubles, family troubles. Your body aching from the hard labor but more urgently for release. So you did what you had to do.

The plan was always simple. Go out to the local bar, get drunk, get high, try to avoid a fight, if possible (and sure as shooting, more likely than not, wasn't possible at all), try to make sure Merle didn't get fucking arrested, and look around to see who was willing. Blow off some steam, fucking _literally_, then spend the weekend hunting in the calm and quiet woods before the whole damn week started over again.

Merle was the _ladies man_ of the family, sure. Good-looking, cocky, and confident. The one who everyone always looked at (good or bad), but most especially, women. But there was usually someone else willing. Willing to look past the older Dixon to the younger, whether pissed that she had been passed over by Merle or just because she liked his own looks better for whatever damn reason.

It wasn't _love_ or anything stupid like that. He knew that, and they, all of the many _theys_, knew that as well. It was the taste of whisky and smoke in a stranger's mouth, the feel of another warm body against your own, grasping and grabbing and taking what you needed, be it in the back room of a bar or his truck or an unfamiliar bed in an unfamiliar house.

He never stayed the night. Never wanted to, never expected to, and knew without a doubt, wasn't wanted to or expected to in return. Everyone knew the rules. _He _knew the rules.

Back then, in the old world, before all of _this_, it was simple.

Now, in the new world, lying here together with her in the prison, it was suddenly impossibly complicated.

She had moved in the night. He had fallen asleep with her head against his stomach, his hand in her hair. He woke up to the faint gray light of dawn to find that she had shifted up until she was lying curled against his side, her head on his shoulder, her arm around his chest.

He wasn't touching her much, not really. One hand was resting just against the small of her back and his other was curled up behind his head as a pillow. Still, as soon as he realized where he was and where _she _was and what was happening, he stiffened and willed himself not to move, anxious somehow to prolong the moment as long as he could.

He laid there and felt her breathing against him and wondered what to do. Everything seemed to have finally slowed down, all the running and scrabbling like rats for survival that the group had been doing for months since the farm.

Yeah, it had been vicious as hell taking the prison. First taking the outer yard, then the courtyard, then him and Rick and T-dog down in the laundry fighting both the dead and the crazy assholes who had been holed up for months in the freaking cafeteria of all places.

But now, it seemed almost...safe. Sure, Hershel had been touch and go for awhile but the night before, the old man had seemed over the worst of it. And there were only two inmates left, and neither seemed like they were going to be much of a problem. Besides, they were both walled off in D Block. Away from the group. Away from her.

So the night before, when she had crept up to the perch to see him, he had let himself relax. She seemed worried sick about Lori. He knew that she was trying to be strong, although damn if she wasn't already the strength and backbone of the whole group, even if she didn't know it. There she was, tending to Hershel, then trying to practice freaking _surgery _on Walkers all alone in the yard, all the while still providing the group with food and smiles and comfort. All despite the fear and worry that only he seemed able to see.

So when she had tiptoed in and looked down at him, he forgave her immediately for snapping at him in the yard. He just wished that he could have the words to reassure her. He knew he didn't. She'd need to go to someone better than him, someone like Rick or Hershel for that.

But he could still protect her while she slept. He was good for that much at least. So he had patted the ground next to him and had felt so damned happy to see the relief on her face when she dropped down quickly and curled up against him, trembling and clutching at his shirt.

He hadn't meant to fall asleep but somehow he had. Now, he was lying as still as he possibly could to avoid waking her.

But suddenly she jerked awake anyway. Disoriented, she seemed to take a minute to realize where she was, grabbing at his shirt a little. Then she was quickly pushing herself up off him, one hand supporting her as she sat up and looked down at him sleepily.

Her face was still scrunched up from sleep, her tank top rumpled with one side falling down her shoulder so that he could see the white strap of her bra. Her hair was sticking straight up. She yawned and rubbed the back of her hand against her face just like a little kid, and he just laid there, looking up at her. She looked…she was just…she looked just freaking _adorable_, and he sighed to himself, knowing that he was in this, whatever this was, way over his head.

She seemed anxious as she looked down at him, still propped up on one arm. He wanted to say something to reassure her. To get her to stay and not bolt away. But he wasn't sure what exactly to say, so he settled for touching her instead. Hell, he was always better at _that _part of it, rather than the talking part, anyway. He started to move his hand behind her, the hand that had been resting against her back all night, up to curl around her waist to pull her closer.

Then she spoke, and he froze. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to fall asleep up here, I should have gone back to be with Lori and Hershel. I'm sorry for disturbing you and, and…"

He sighed and looked away from her anxious eyes looking down into his. Always apologizing. Always trying to get away. He dropped his hand, unseen behind her, back to the floor without touching her. He shifted his body away and looked up at the gray ceiling.

"Thought I told you. Stop apologizin'"

She smiled down at him, relief in her face that he wasn't mad, and yawned sleepily again. Then she seemed to realize where she was, how close they were still on the hard ground of the perch. She stared down at him intently, and she seemed about to speak. But then they both heard the unmistakable sounds of the others moving below in the cell block. She turned her head away from him, listening intently.

"Oh God. Hershel, I can't believe I left him." She immediately shifted away and pulled herself to her feet, worry and guilt in her whole posture, as she hurried to the entry. Then she was gone, not even looking back at him as she ran down the stairs to get to the cells below. He just laid there for a few minutes, wondering how in the hell he was going to get through this.

Later that morning, Rick pulled him and her and T-dog out to the yard to secure the fences, clean up the dead Walkers, and move the cars to secure the entryways. The sun was shining and the morning air seemed so clear.

He watched her out of the corner of his eye. She had changed into a bright red tank top and wrapped a scarf around her head. She seemed almost to be bouncing. She chattered to him excitedly as they went outside that Hershel was better.

The two of them worked together wordlessly to pick up the Walkers and pile them together in a heap, while Rick and T-dog took the other side of the yard. He watched the strong muscles in her arms move as she lifted and hefted the Walkers, determined to pull her own weight. She laughed when he made a terse comment about the smell as though he was some kinda freaking comedian, even though what he had said hadn't even been that damn funny. With her, he felt himself relaxing, and moving easily as they worked. Still always staying as close as possible.

He was so focused on her that he almost didn't hear Rick wondering aloud where Glenn and Maggie were. But he pulled himself together. He knew damn well where they were. He yelled up to the watchtower and waited with the others until Glenn wandered out, shirtless.

He heard her laugh and glanced over to see her looking at him and smiling. He found himself smiling back (like an idiot), then reaching out almost playfully to grab at her belt (like an idiot). She laughed and pushed out at him, dodging away to head to one of the cars.

One of his earliest memories was of his mama taking him to church. He couldn't remember much, other than that he had been uncomfortable wearing the clip-on tie and that the service had been entirely too long to his reckoning, and that his mama had scolded him repeatedly for swinging his feet and kicking the pew.

When she had died, all the churchgoing had died with her. Truth be told, they hadn't gone that much anyway in the last couple years of her life. His daddy was gone, wherever the hell he was off to, and Merle was off upstate in juvie. She had just withdrawn more and more into herself, drinking and sitting alone in her bedroom. And then she was gone, and he was alone.

When that happened, he had put aside all of that church crap and the rest of her pointless wishes and dreams and stories. Tried to be _zen _(as soon as he realized there was a name for what he was trying to be), to take everything as it came, just react and move on with it. He had been so angry with the group when the little girl had first gone missing. Just sitting around talking and wishing that she would be okay. He had tried to tell them that there wasn't no point in all that hoping and praying. You just had to get out there and try and if it didn't happen, you moved on and tried to forget it by your ownself. And if that didn't work, drink or screw or hunt, and forget it that way.

But standing there in the yard, with the fences all around them keeping the dead out, it seemed like maybe there was a chance to be hopeful. Something maybe worth praying for. Especially when he looked at her.

She was bright and laughing, and as he watched her skip across the yard to move one of the cars at Rick's request, he felt himself just relax. This could be it. Maybe somehow it would finally all slow down. And there would be time. Enough time for all of it. Time to settle in and plant and grow. Time for all of them, but mostly, time for him and her.

He just stood there and felt himself wanting to smile like a fool as he looked at her. In that moment, for just a second, he reckoned that maybe there was something after all in all this hoping and praying.


	18. Chapter 18

**The First Time She Said Good-Bye**

Her head was aching and every breath hurt. She'd been beaten enough by Ed to recognize that at a minimum, she had a concussion and several cracked (but more likely, broken) ribs. Her ankle was blown out too, she had felt it pull and then roll under her in her heavy boot as she had tried to dodge a Walker. And she was so so thirsty. And so tired. And so alone.

She was slumped on the floor in an empty cell in the basement of the prison. It was pitch black. This must have been where they put the prisoners in solitary. There were no windows, no furniture, nothing but a tiny room with four solid walls and a steel door. She couldn't see a thing and she couldn't hear a thing, except the sound of her own labored breaths and the muted sound of the herd stumbling outside the door.

It didn't seem real. Hours ago (or was it days by now?), she had been standing in the yard, shielding her eyes from the sun while they all laughed up at Glenn and Maggie shuffling shame-faced down from the watch tower. The night before (or was it two nights? She was so fuzzy that she simply couldn't tell), she had slept all night safe by his side, then spent the whole morning working together with him in the yard. Just watching the sun in his hair and the worry relax out of his face while they moved together without speaking.

She had gone back up to the courtyard after moving one of the cars, while he and Rick and Glenn had made their way to the far side of the fence to start piling up the dead Walkers. And then Hershel had actually made his way outside, moving slowly and gingerly with his crutches. She had felt so happy and so exhilarated to see it. It was all finally happening. They were all finally safe.

And ten seconds later, it had gone to hell. Somehow, the courtyard doors had been opened and Walkers were streaming in. She had run forward, terrified, trying to cover Lori and Carl's retreat, while Maggie had led them back into the cell block. And then she had watched in open-mouthed horror as T-dog had been bit while he tried desperately to lock the gates again.

She had grabbed at his arm and pulled him deeper into the prison. Running through her mind was the frantic thought that if they could just find a safe room to stop and she could examine him, she could save T, just like Rick had saved Hershel. It was foolish, he was bitten too far up his shoulder, just like Sophia. But as they had ran together clutching each other deeper into the prison, it was the only thing she could think about.

They hadn't been able to find the others. They had run this way and that, and found every escape route blocked. The two of them finally fought their way back up to the entrance to the far side of the courtyard and had seen that the corridor ahead was blocked by Walkers. Before she could stop him or even knew what was happening, T-dog had rushed forward to grab them. He had been screaming at her to run, run, go!

T had them pushed them against the wall, clearing a path for her while they clawed and bit at his face and shoulders. She had felt herself sobbing, but he kept screaming and she had to leave him. So his courage and sacrifice wouldn't be in vain. She had dodged past the snarling heap to the light from the door leading outside.

She burst out into the bright sunshine on the far side of the courtyard and ran down the little staircase. She knew that she needed to run through the yard and around the side of the prison to where she had last seen the group in the front. The noise from the sirens all around the roof was deafening but still she could hear the sounds of the group fighting on the far side of the building out of her sight. She could hear the gunfire and even in that terrified moment, it amazed her that she could distinguish between the unique sounds the different pistols and handguns and rifles made. She had learned so much about guns these past few months.

And she could hear the shouts. She could hear Rick shouting for Carl and Lori, Beth's high-pitched scream, and more faintly, Glenn, who must have been farther away, yelling his head off about Maggie. And she could hear him. She couldn't make out what he was yelling, but his hoarse deep voice was unmistakable. Was he calling for her?

Her gun was empty and all she had left was the knife that he had given her. She made to dart through the yard, but it was impossible. Her way back to the front of the courtyard, back to _him_, was cut off. The dead were closing in on all sides around her, hungry and desperate for her blood.

The only way out was back in. So she turned and ran back up the stairs and back into the prison. T-dog had fallen, lying still finally on the floor, with two Walkers crouched over him, _eating _him. She ran past them and one stood up, faster than she would have expected, and grabbed for her head, catching her scarf instead. She shook it free and kept running.

She ran down the halls and down another flight of stairs, trying desperately to circle her way back to C Block. But the dead were everywhere. She ran past an open cell and then she heard the snarl behind her.

She turned, holding up the knife in the way that he had taught her. It was only one Walker, but it moved quickly when it saw her, cornering her against the wall. It grabbed at her chest, and she slammed herself back against the wall to get away from its scratching fingers.

Her head knocked back against the concrete, and pain shot through her skull while her vision went suddenly white. Still, she fought. She held the knife as far above her head as she could while it bit at her, then drove it down through its skull. It fell forward slumped against her and terror flowed through her when she felt its lips and nose against her neck. It was going to bite her. It was going to tear out her throat. She fought like an animal, even though there was nowhere to go with her back against the wall.

She pushed and twisted, and suddenly her feet slipped out from under her in the blood and gore underneath. She fell heavily to the ground with the Walker still tangled up on top of her. She heard a snap as her side hit the ground, and she felt the pain dart up her right side. That's when she realized that the Walker she stabbed was dead, and although its dead lips were still pressed against her skin, it wasn't going to bite her.

She laid there and tried to catch her breath through the pain and agony, but it still wasn't over. Another Walker was coming around the corner. She pushed the dead body off her while also trying to pull her knife from the top of the skull. She dragged herself to her feet and slumped against the wall, fighting for breath.

This one was taller, bigger. She wouldn't be able to get the leverage to stab it through the top of the skull like the other. So when it came at her, she tried to stab upwards through the jaw, like she had seen Maggie do in the courtyard. But she had the angle all wrong, and the knife just went up harmlessly through its cheek and jowls and stuck there.

It was pushing her back, trying to grab at her while she held both of its arms in a death grip away from her neck. She could hear others approaching from down the hall. She was defenseless. Her knife was still sticking out of the dead thing's face. Weaponless. Again.

It continued to push her back, getting ever closer. So when she felt the door knob stabbing into her back, she knew that it was her last chance. She threw one hand behind her and twisted the knob and slipped backwards into the darkness. She didn't know what the room was or whether there were other dead inside, but it was her only shot.

Once inside, she tried to brace herself and pulled at the door knob to keep the door closed for what seemed like hours. It was so hot. She was panting. She couldn't seem to fill her lungs with air and every deep breath was a stab in her side. Her hands were sweating and slippery against the door. Then the last thing she remembered was of her hands twisting off the knob as she felt herself fall backwards against the wall.

Time passed.

She came to to find herself slumped against the wall. The door wouldn't open more than a few inches, as though something was blocking it from the outside.

She tried not to fall asleep. She had to stay awake to hear the others come look for her, for when he came to look for her. So she could shout out and he could pull the blocked door open. And she knew it was dangerous to go to sleep with a concussion. But she hurt so bad. She could feel the blood in her hair dripping down her face and her chest was on fire.

She willed herself not to fall asleep, but she must have because suddenly her parents were there, talking to her gently. She blinked to clear her head, and they were gone. She was alone again.

Time passed.

She came to again with a start. The door was still blocked. She was alone. No one came.

Time passed.

The hours went by. Or was it days by now. Her lips were so dry that she felt them split and then the blood well up from the cracks. She licked at the moisture, so very thirsty, so desperate to wet her mouth, even as she cringed in disgust at swallowing her own blood. She was only one step away from being like the Walkers, eating at human blood and flesh. Soon, she'd be the same as them. But she knew that she just had to hold on. He would come find her. He would look for her just like he looked for Sophia.

Time passed.

She was still alone. He didn't come.

Maybe he figured she was dead or as good as. Maybe that's why he didn't come. After all, after that first disastrous trip to Atlanta, he had never tried to look for Merle again. And when Andrea had gone down at the farm and he had been the first one on the road to suggest going back for her, when Rick had shot the idea down, he hadn't pressed it. Merle had been his brother. And Andrea had been his friend, from all she could tell. If he didn't go look for Merle or Andrea, why would he be coming to look for her? He was a realist, after all. A survivor. And survival was for the living, not for those who were one step from death like she was.

But still. She thought that he would have come. That she had been different to him somehow. Thought he would come look for her even if he hadn't for his brother or his friend.

Maybe he had died too. Maybe that's why he wasn't coming to look for her, because he had fallen in the courtyard. But no, that thought was too horrible. It was a worse thought than thinking he didn't care enough to come look for her. She'd rather the thought that he wasn't looking but alive and well and fixing to live to a grouchy old age than the thought that he could be lying cold and dead in the courtyard. It was enough that he had looked for Sophia, and it was enough that he had been there all the times that she had needed him before.

Time passed.

Sophia was there. She was sitting quietly against the other wall, playing with her doll. Her little girl's neck was unmarked. Sophia was happy and smiling. She smiled back and tried to speak and lift her hand to pull Sophia close, but then everything went black and faded again.

Time passed.

She came to. She was struggling so hard to breathe now, each breath coming short and shallow and filled with so much pain that she knew it would just be easier to stop. She had slumped over from the wall. Her cheek was resting on the cool concrete and it felt almost like relief in contrast to the hot burning dryness of her mouth and throat.

It couldn't last much longer. She must be slipping away. She imagined that she could hear other voices now, besides Sophia's, besides her parents. She couldn't make them out, but they were louder, then softer. She just closed her eyes. She didn't try to focus on them. They weren't real.

_Carol_. She opened her eyes at the sound of his voice. He was sitting right beside her, but not touching her. Cross-legged, looking down at the bow in his lap with his hair in his eyes. She could _see _him so clearly, see every inch of his face, even though it was black as hell. It wasn't possible, she knew that. But there he was.

She tried to smile up at him, but he didn't look at her. Just kept concentrating on what he was doing. He spoke again though. Curtly. Ordering her. _Sit up. _She tried to, but it hurt too much to move. She closed her eyes instead and hoped that he would come closer. Run his fingers through her hair again. It would be so nice to fall asleep like that. It was all she wanted.

He didn't seem to care what she wanted though. He was still looking down at lap, running the bolts through his fingers, still not even looking at her but ordering her about all the same. More urgently this time.

_Carol. Kick the door. Make some noise. _

She wanted to try. For him. But it was too late, and she was just too weak. It was time to say good-bye instead. Funny, that word…"good-bye." She had probably said it a thousand times in the old world. At the end of a phone call to a telemarketer, off-handedly to a checker at the supermarket, to Sophia, even if she was just running out to play in the yard for an hour. She said it all the time back then. Good-bye.

But they never said it to each other. It had taken her awhile to notice it, but she had finally realized that it was something the two of them never said. Good-bye. If he was leaving overnight on a hunt, if she was staying behind with Lori and Carl while he and Rick scouted, if they were going to be separated for days or just hours or for any time at all, they never said good-bye to each other. It was always _don't get bit, stay safe, see you soon_. Never good-bye.

But it seemed fitting now. Appropriate. She tried to whisper it to him, even with no voice left, as she laid there on the hard ground. Good-bye.

She thought he would say it back so she could finally go to sleep. But he didn't. Instead, his voice sounded angry. _No. Sit. Up. _She was annoyed. Even now, so stubborn. And so unwilling to face the truth. She just couldn't do it. Couldn't he see that? She could only move if he helped her, and she knew that wasn't possible. He wasn't even there. He couldn't help her.

_I will. _She looked up when he spoke. He was finally looking down at her, his eyes so serious. _I will. But you gotta sit up first._ He was nodding to her. Looking at her intently but not moving to help. Just like he had the first time that she had tried to shoot months before. Telling her that he would be there for her but that she had to do it for herself.

She sighed and gave in. With the last of her strength, she pushed herself up, groaning soundlessly at the crunch in her side and the nausea rising in her throat. She rested her head against the wall again, and slowly inched her leg towards the door. It seemed to take hours. Finally, her foot was there, and she pushed against the door weakly, feeling rather than seeing the door open out a few inches, before closing again heavily. She did it again.

She opened her eyes and looked over to see his reaction. But he was gone. And without even saying good-bye.

She'd try for a little while longer. Maybe he would come back and sit with her again before it was all over.


	19. Chapter 19

**The First Time He Stopped Moving**

_Keep moving. Don't think about it. _

It had become his mantra, running over and over through his head the past two and a half days.

One minute, he and Rick and Glenn had been standing on the far side of the prison yard, watching Hershel move down the steps carefully with his new crutches. The next minute, the three of them had been staring in disbelief as Walkers flooded the yard behind the rest of the group.

He had moved on autopilot, following Rick at a dead run between the fences as they sprinted back up to the rest of the group. It had just kept running through his head. _Keep moving. Keep moving._

They had finally made it up to the courtyard to find that most of them were gone, only Beth and Hershel still out in the yard and barricaded in the upper staircase. Like a machine, he had shot and stabbed with Rick and Glenn at his side. It had been chaos. The noise from the loudspeakers had been deafening. Everyone shooting and yelling and running every which way.

The first thing they had done was move deeper into the prison to get the damn siren turned off, to prevent any more from filling the yard. After they had, they ran through the halls, taking down the Walkers that seemed to well up from all sides like rats from the cracks. They couldn't find Lori or Carl or Maggie anywhere despite their shouts. They couldn't find T-dog. And he couldn't find her, no matter how much he searched and called. _Keep moving. Don't think about it._

Finally, they had come around the corner near the back entrance to the courtyard to find two of the dead slumped over, still pawing and eating at a large figure on the ground that could only have been T-dog. They took down the Walkers easily and then had stood there in shock, staring down at what was left of T's body.

The lump in his throat had been almost choking him. The worry gnawing at him about where she could be. Surely, she would have made it out. The damn scarf was right near the entrance.

He had known that he would see her in the courtyard. He just knew it. She had to have made it out, why else would the damn scarf be just lying there? He would have bet his life on it. So he kept Rick and Oscar moving, kept them from stopping near T and thinking about it.

He pushed them forward and they burst out into the bright sun in the courtyard. But she wasn't there. He spun in a circle, looking all around, trying desperately to think where she would have gone.

And then suddenly there was a high-pitched little cry and Maggie and Carl were there. Maggie was crying, covered in blood, and clutching a little bundle. But that wasn't what he was staring at. He couldn't look away from Carl and the dead look in his empty pale face.

He knew immediately what had happened. Lori was gone. And that must mean she was gone too. He and Rick hadn't seen nothing in their run through the prison basement, and if they hadn't, and if she hadn't been with Maggie and Carl when they made it out the other way, that meant she was gone too. Just like T-dog. Just like Lori.

This couldn't be happening. He looked around desperately, looking for help, pacing back and forth while clutching the bow, but there was no help anywhere. Maggie was shaking and crying in Glenn's arms. Holding up her hands still covered in blood, like they burned her or something. Hershel and Beth were staring at the baby in shock. And Carl's face. The kid looked like he was made of stone. Rick was on the ground, groaning, screaming.

_Keep moving. Don't think about it. _

Someone had to step up, take charge, do something. Someone had to fucking take charge and fucking do _something_. No one did. They all just stood there like they were frozen. He ran to Rick and tried to get him to focus, to get him to stand up and help him, but he was too far gone.

He heard the baby cry again. She had had such hope for Lori's just needed to keep moving and think about the baby. He rode to the nearest town with Maggie behind him, feeling her clutching his back. It was weird, he never rode with Maggie, only her. But he pushed that thought away, forced himself to ignore it. He had to concentrate, where had they seen the little homemade signs for that daycare center? Place like that must have something a baby could eat. Formula and bottles and diapers and shit.

_Keep moving. Don't think about it. Just don't think about it. _

That night after they had gotten back and fed little Asskicker the bottle, he volunteered for watch. He had to get away, do something. So he spent the whole night walking the perimeter, focused completely on every inch of the fence, making sure that none of the dead could get in. He walked the same path again and again until dawn.

The next day, he went for a hunt. Glenn didn't want him to go. Said they needed to dig the graves and lay the three to rest. That was fucking crap. There wasn't anything left of Lori or of _her_ to bury anyway, and damned if he'd stop moving to stand around in a circle and listen to the rest of them cry.

Beside they were running low on meat and who knew when the hell the group'd be strong enough to go out for a run again. So he stayed in the woods all day, until he was sure the damn "funeral" was over. He searched and hunted and brought down squirrel after squirrel, methodically pulling out his bolts and hooking the carcasses to his belt one by one. _Keep moving._

That night, at dusk, he came across the creek and saw the little white flowers blooming there. The same little Cherokee roses. He almost stopped for awhile. Almost sat down next to the little flowers to put his head in his hands and finally fucking face it. But he didn't. Just couldn't. So he just tore off one of the little flowers and marched back to the prison.

_Keep moving, don't think about it._

Before he took the game in to the others, he made himself walk out to the graves. This was all crap, he knew that. She wasn't lying there in the ground, no more than Lori was lying next to her. At least with Sophia, they had put her body in the grave and piled the dirt and rocks over her again. Sophia had _been there_. There had been somewhere to go, somewhere to mourn, knowing that the person you loved was lying at rest in the ground underneath you.

But she wasn't there. They hadn't found her. He hadn't found her. And there had been nothing to bury. Just like his mama, all those years ago. It was a cruel joke, to put this little flower down next to a shitty wooden cross. It didn't mean nothing. He hadn't found her, and she wasn't lying in peace.

_Keep moving. Don't think about it._

He put the flower down anyway and headed back in to the others.

He had to eat. Choke down some food to keep his strength up so he could keep going. Rick was still gone. Hershel said he was safe in the boiler room, although he didn't say what the hell he was doing down there. It would be nice to let go like Rick had. Just take off alone down to the bottom of the prison and stab and shoot and kill anything that came in your way. He wanted to. Jesus Christ, every second he almost stopped moving, he wanted to. But he held back. His hands were shaking as he shoveled the food in. As soon as he was done, he grabbed his bow and went out to patrol again for the night.

The next morning, he took Carl and Oscar down to try to secure the lower levels. He talked to Carl, more than he ever had before. Just so he wouldn't think about it. And because the more cells that they cleared out and the more hallways that they went down without finding her body, it was becoming clearer and clearer what must have happened.

There were only so many places she could be down in the closed-off prison basement level. And since she hadn't made it back to the yard, she was either lying dead somewhere, mauled and half-eaten like Lori or T, or she was one of _them_, like Sophia. He honestly didn't know which was worse. So he forced himself not to think about it. _Keep moving. _Keep talking to Carl.

Then he found her knife, still sticking out of the dead bastard's face. And he knew that he was close. He sent Carl and Oscar back up to C-block and sat down tiredly in front of the blocked cell.

He just sat there stabbing the knife in the ground, still moving, still not able to sit still, watching the heavy door move open, then slam closed. Open, closed, open, closed. Again and again. She was in there.

He kept stabbing the ground. He didn't care that he was dulling the point of her knife. What goddamn difference did it make, she wasn't going to be using it again anyhows. He had his answer. She was one of them now, like Sophia. And like Sophia, someone was going to have to put her down. He breathed heavily and slammed the knife against the wall, trying to work up the rage he needed to do it. _Keep moving, don't think about it._

He forced himself up and paced up and down the hall, gathering his will. Then he bit down on the knife and grabbed at the Walker blocking the door with both hands. He pulled it back with all his strength and shoved it aside. He yanked the door outwards and went into a defensive stance and waited to see her stumble out from the cell.

She didn't stumble out.

It took him several seconds to adjust to the sight, to actually believe what he was looking at, but finally he realized what he was seeing. She was slumped seated against the wall. Head covered in blood. Breathing shallowly. Blinking up disoriented at the sudden light. Smiling faintly when she saw it was him. Blue eyes still clear.

He blinked stupidly and fell to his knees beside her, reaching out to touch her face. He just couldn't believe what the hell he was seeing.

"You came back," she whispered, "I knew you would." Well, that didn't make any damn sense. She must have hit her head or was dehydrated or something. He knew that he had to get her to Hershel as quick as possible. _Keep moving_. He started to get up quickly, to put one arm under her knees to lift her.

"No." Her voice was so thin. "Don't leave." One hand moved up weakly to grab at his shirt front and pull him back down.

"I'm not," he told her gruffly, "just gettin' you outta here." He moved again to stand and lean over her to pick her up, but she held on to his shirt doggedly and shook her head.

"No. Please. Don't leave," she whispered, trying to tug him closer.

He sank down next to her and she smiled gratefully. She leaned against him, her head slumped against his chest. One hand was still buried in his shirt while her other crept up in his lap to grab his fingers. He put his arm around her and pulled her closer. He had to get her back, but he could sit here for just a bit. Just until his heart stopped pounding in his ears and he could see again through the tears. He rested his cheek against her head and finally stopped moving.


	20. Chapter 20

**The First Time She Blamed Him**

She had never blamed him. Not ever for his surliness or his insults or his behavior. Not for anything. How could she possibly? At the end of the day, she owed everything to him and she knew it. He had looked for Sophia without any care for his own life. She would never forget that. And now he had come for her and found her and brought her back.

So it had taken her some time to understand that he was actually _apologizing _to her, that he was holding her head with a shaking hand and was actually asking her to _forgive _him.

She had come to in her cell with the blackness and the fog finally receding. Her head had been pounding, her vision blurred, her sides aching, but she had still recognized the cell. It was the cell she and Lori had picked out. Her things were still piled in the corner. Lori's as well.

It all flooded back. The hours of sitting in that _tomb _and waiting to die. The hallucinations, the pain, the hopelessness. But here she was. Lying on her uninjured side with a cup of water pressed against her lips. She drank greedily, but it was pulled away much too soon. She tried to protest, but then she heard his voice. "No. Only a little. Be sick otherwise."

She sighed and began to drift off but as soon as she felt herself slipping away, she heard herself gasp, scared, and she reached out blindly for his hand. She was just desperate to know that he was still there, that he hadn't left like he had when she had been alone in the dark. But immediately, one hand was in hers and she felt the other curl up warm in her hair. He shushed her. "Not goin' anywhere. You're safe."

When she opened her eyes again, he was still there. Sitting on the floor next to the bunk beds, his head resting against the mattress. As soon as he saw her eyes open, he pressed the cup against her lips again. "Slowly," he ordered, "you gotta go slow."

His face was so close. She was shocked at the sight of him. His eyes were bloodshot, the lines in his face prominent, and he just looked so very very tired. She had never seen him like that before, and it just about killed her now. She knew she had to smile, to try to reassure him. Anything to take that look off his face.

He kept trying to press the cup to her lips, but she moved her mouth away even though she was desperate for more water. She wanted to let him know how much she appreciated what he had done. "Thank you, Daryl, thank you…you came and I…" But his hand clenched in her hair roughly, hurting her a little, and so she stopped, taken aback by the look on his face. "Goddamnit, stop. Just stop. I'd of come sooner if I knew you were down there."

His voice was so raw and suddenly it seemed as though he couldn't meet her eyes. He dropped his head, but she could still see the muscle twitching in his jaw. And then she knew. He thought she blamed him. For not coming to find her. For not looking for her.

Despite the pain in her head and side and the dryness of her throat, she almost laughed. That he could actually blame himself and even possibly think that _she _blamed _him_. When here she was lying safe and whole and it was all because of him.

She loved him so much in that moment. Of course, on some level she always had, almost since she had first met him, but in that moment, seeing how affected he was and knowing how good he was, and being so damn thankful that the _thought_ of him had kept her going while the reality of him had actually come to find her, she loved him so much that it hurt.

She pulled her hand out of his and reached up to thread it in his hair, tugging gently until he lifted his head and met her eyes. She smiled even though she felt her lips crack, and she tried to pull him closer. He seemed uncertain, searching her face as if to see if she was sure. But then she watched him put the cup of water down on the ground, and he curled his hand around her neck.

She tugged him closer and he let her, but before she could bring his head down to hers, he pulled back. "I'm sorry," he whispered again, "I woulda come if I'd of known."

She shook her head. Anything to make him shut up. She'd never blamed him, and she never would. She kept pulling him closer, and she watched as he closed his eyes and seemed to sigh. Then her lips found his. She'd wanted this for so long, ever since that night at the CDC, and never thought it would happen again. Her hand was in his hair clutching him closer and she felt his hand curled against her head doing the same. She parted her lips and then felt the soft heat of his mouth as she kissed him.

It felt so good kissing him, so right. She wanted more. She tried to sit up in the bed, to pull herself closer to him. But she winced involuntarily at the movement, and immediately he registered her pain and pulled away. She tried to pull him back but it was over. "Gotta find Hershel." And then he was gone. Just like that.

She was alone for several long minutes. She rolled over on her side, trying to find a position that didn't hurt while she strained to listen to the rest of the group down the hall. Her mind was racing. Had she maniuplated him somehow or taken advantage of the moment? He had seemed so guilty about not coming for her earlier. Had he been humoring her somehow or had he wanted it too? She wasn't sure. She just wanted him to come back.

And then he did, but he wasn't alone. The group was suddenly all around her, and she was overwhelmed. First with relief at the sight of them all, then with joy upon seeing the little baby, then with agony when she realized that Lori was gone, and then with fear and worry at the news that Glenn and Maggie had somehow been taken.

After that, things seemed to move lightning fast. Suddenly, half the group was leaving, headed off to this strange town. And she didn't have even a moment alone with him. Everyone was rushing and packing and preparing. He came and stood by her before he left and watched her hold the baby. She looked up and searched his face, but all he said was the same kind of thing they always said when they were about to be apart. There was nothing special in the good-bye. Nothing to acknowledge what had happened in the cell.

Then they were all gone.

The next couple days, she cooked, she cleaned, she washed, she mended. She consulted with Hershel. She took care of Lori's precious baby. She reassured Beth. She looked out for Carl. She kept an eye on Axel who seemed to be keeping an eye on Beth. And she thought about him constantly and what would happen when he and the others returned.

That morning, she and Carl took watch near the prison entrance, so hopeful that the others would be back at any minute. She tried to push him out of her mind while she talked to Carl and comfort him as much as he would let her, while her heart ached for both Lori and for what the boy had had to do and for what he was going through.

Suddenly, they both heard the sound of a car moving and the two of them moved together, running to the front gates to open them for the car. Once the car was in, Carl rushed to pull the door secure again while she frantically searched the windows of the car. Rick, Glenn, Maggie, Michonne. But not him.

She stepped back from the car in a daze. She felt paralyzed. The ache in her chest was so big that she couldn't breathe. Rick was approaching her, his hands spread out to appease her, calm her, but the sight of him reaching for her almost made her gag. He was going to say that they had lost him back at the town. That he was dead. Gone. Not coming back.

Her hand holding the rifle was numb, and she felt the gun thud to the ground. Her other hand curled to her stomach to protect herself from the blow that she knew was coming.

When it came though, it was a different blow than what she expected. _With Merle._ _Not dead. Gone._ _Not coming back_. She couldn't remember exactly what happened afterwards. She remembered Rick pulling her to him. She remembered burying her face against his body while he clutched her to him with one hand on her neck. But the rest was a fog.

She spent that night in the perch with his things. She put her face in his shirt to try to smell him still even while she hated herself for it. What a goddamn fool she had been all this time. She realized that now.

All this time, she had thought that they meant something special to each other. Not lovers, no, she knew it would never be like that, but important somehow still. What a joke. He had left her without a second thought. Without any message to her other than what Glenn told her he had said, "she'll understand."

He could have come back with the others. Just long enough to have picked up his things and said good-bye. If he was so damn worried about Merle, he could have left him outside the gates long enough to have come in, picked up his pack, and said a good-bye to the baby, the group, and most especially, her. But no. He left. Leaving everything behind. Because it didn't mean anything to him. His clothes, his pack, his spare crossbow, the baby, the group, and her. And not even a message or note to live on other than "she'll understand."

She knew she was being foolish. She had no pull on him. Never had. He had never given her cause to believe any way else, save for the closeness she had forced on him a couple of times.

Still, she hated him for making her feel this way. She sat there in his perch, clutching his shirt to her face, and she blamed him. For making her hopeful to live in this world with him by her side, for making her need him. She blamed him the most for making her love him, and then leaving without a backwards glance.

At dawn, she pulled herself up and rubbed her hands over her face. She packed all his things away in his bag and toted them downstairs to store in one of the empty cells in D Block. She wouldn't go back for them again. It was time to be done with all that, the way she should have been done with it long before.

She squared her shoulders and went back to C Block to start breakfast for the others. She put him out of her mind. He wasn't a part of the group anymore, and the rest of it didn't matter. Whatever she felt or had felt wasn't important. Hate him, love him, what was the difference. He wasn't coming back anyway.

**A/N Thank you everyone who has reviewed, I ****so**** appreciate it, and a special thanks to Dara for guest reviewing tonight and motivating me to keep going! I've been super busy at work but she reminded me that I still have a couple chapters to go before I get to the end of Season 3!**


	21. Chapter 21

**The First Time He Chose Her Over Merle**

Everything had just happened so fast.

From the moment at the prison that he had looked up to see the dead streaming into the courtyard, things had been moving lightning quick without any time to really think.

First, they had only just cleared the prison again when they had headed off to this town in the middle of nowhere to look for Glenn and Maggie.

The trip there had been grueling in and of itself. Rick seemed to be barely hanging on, and he watched him with concern. And he watched Oscar and this new person - _Michonne _- with anxious suspicion. Oscar seemed like a good sort, but he'd never seen him really fight. And this woman had come out of nowhere and he didn't like it one bit that she was with them, like she was a part of the group.

Then they had made it into town and suddenly it was a different kind of fight. For the first time, they weren't fighting drooling brainless bastards but fighting the living who had guns and could think. It was chaos.

He had been covering the group's retreat over the school bus when he had run out of ammo and been surrounded. Someone had cocked him hard over the head and the next thing he knew, he was being dragged, blindfolded and half-senseless, into a screaming circle of more people than he had seen alive in almost a year.

He had barely been able to understand what was happening. Where he was, who all these people were, why the hell everyone was yelling, how the fuck _Andrea_ was standing there looking at him with shock, but most of all, what his _brother_ was doing in the circle with him.

He had been forced to fight Merle but that had barely begun before smoke and bullets were filling the circle, and he was running with Rick and Maggie and Merle through the woods for half the night.

And now they were standing here in the middle of the road, him, Rick, Glenn, and Maggie, and even though things had finally slowed down with the killings on one hand, everything still seemed to be moving as fast as ever on the other. He just couldn't believe they were having this damn conversation, and it was all moving too quickly for him to try to make sense of it.

Back at the town, he had chosen Rick over Merle. When he had heard Glenn say that his brother was there, everything in him had told him to leave, go find him, go find the only blood he had left in the world. But then he had had Rick in his face, all but begging him to stay and help. And he had. Didn't that mean a thing to these people? He had given up the chance to go find his brother. His brother who the damn group had abandoned to die a year before. He had given that up to stay with Rick and the group and watch their backs and try to get away with _them_, not Merle. Now to have to stand here and hear Rick tell him that he wasn't worth the same damn loyalty, the same damn courtesy, the same damn, hell, _worth_, as the rest of them.

It just didn't make any sense. They were willing to let that woman come back to the prison, that woman with a freaking sword who never spoke and seemed more dangerous than him and Merle put together. _She_ was a goddamn stranger. More than that, she had abandoned them as soon as they got into town and went off to Lord knows where, leaving them to fight alone and lose Oscar along the way. Still, she was somehow good enough to bring into the precious prison, but not him and Merle.

In the back of his mind, he understood that Rick and Glenn and Maggie were saying _he _was welcome back, just not Merle. They were all so damn anxious to assure him that they weren't abandoning him, just asking him to abandon Merle. Again. But he kept pushing that aside, because he and Merle were a pair. There was no _him_ without Merle. Couldn't they see that?

Merle wasn't no rapist, Jesus Christ. Did he honestly have to stand here and _reassure_ them all of that? Did they think that's what kind of person his brother was and did they think if there was even a chance of something like that happening he would be arguing to bring him back to where they lived? To where she was?

Maggie's reaction made sense. She had never met Merle before at the quarry, had only knew him at the town. And he could tell by the look on her face and the fact that she was wearing Glenn's shirt instead of her own, that something had happened to her back in town. Something horrible. He winced away from the look in her eyes. He understood why Maggie couldn't get it.

But Glenn? He had lived with Merle for weeks back at the quarry. And yeah, Merle had been an asshole and high as a kite the whole time to boot. But he hadn't hurt nobody or, he sighed to himself, _succeeded_ in hurting somebody. And yeah, Glenn's battered face told him clearly enough what Merle had done in town. But shit like this happened nowadays. Dammit, hadn't he had to do the same thing to that stupid kid Randall back at the farm to try to get information? And freaking Shane had about broke his arm restraining him at the quarry. And Rick had pulled a gun on him three freaking times. Andrea had even shot him in the damn head. He'd gotten past all that, in time, and they could get past all this shit with Merle, in time. If they would try. But they weren't even willing to try.

And Rick, damn Rick for making him choose like this. After what they had been through and what they had done for each other. He had thought that Rick at least would understand. But a whole year of watching each other's backs was being wiped out in one conversation. He could see Rick's face and knew that he wasn't thinking of him as himself anymore, as his friend _Daryl_, but instead as just a _Dixon_, like Merle. And Dixons were white trash - everybody knew that. It had been this way his whole life. He'd been a fool to think it had finally changed.

Then Glenn played his trump card. He asked him what _she _would think of him leaving. But it backfired. That was the last damn straw, the one thing that convinced him to go. He looked at his friend in contempt and told him that she'd understand. Unspoken, he thought, _the way the rest of y'all can't. _She wouldn't have ever asked him to leave Merle. So she'd understand why he was leaving now, he just knew it.

His mind made up, he turned his back on all of them and chose Merle. And as he walked off with his brother, he forced himself not to look back. He forced himself to be zen and start forgetting about all of them. Hell, at the end of the day, he'd known them all less than a year. They weren't blood and they never would be. Wouldn't be so hard to move on.

Alone together that night, Merle took first watch while he slept. It had been days since he had. Several hours later, when Merle kicked him awake to take watch, he felt clearer and more rested than he had in weeks.

He sat in front of the fire and watched his brother sleep. Things had finally slowed down and he could hear himself think. It had always been the two of them, him and Merle. People came along and stayed for awhile - family, friends, women - but it didn't matter nothing who they were or why they came along, they all left in the end. And then it was just the two of them again, him and Merle.

But sitting here alone, head finally clear, he was beginning to think that he'd made the biggest mistake of his life. Was he really never going back to the prison again? Never see any of them again, never go out to hunt for supplies for Lil' Asskicker, not be there when that bastard "Governor" came to kill them all? And shit, call a spade a spade, what he was thinking about the most was her.

He'd told Glenn that she would understand, and in the heat of the moment with everything moving so fast, he had known that she would. But now, that seemed so wrong. He couldn't understand why he had thought it. Sitting at the fire, he tried to convince himself that he'd done the right thing. She would have said the same things as Rick. Hell, if Rick wouldn't trust him, she would have done the same thing. She and Rick were so different in so many ways, but so alike too. He told himself she wouldn't have accepted him with Merle either, just like the others.

But as the hours passed by, sitting quietly by the fire, he just couldn't stop thinking on it, and he knew it wasn't true. And more than that, he knew that she wasn't going to understand, because he didn't really understand it any more himself. Had he really left without saying goodbye, without even going back to the prison to explain it to her? And was he really never going to see her again after just finding her? How had she reacted when Rick came back and told her? Had she been angry? Had she cried? He couldn't stop thinking about it.

After he had found her in that tomb and brought her back, he had sat there next to her cot and watched her sleep. And he had just been so damn relieved and so thankful that he could barely swallow past the lump in his throat. It was a miracle. When she had opened her eyes finally and smiled at him, he hadn't never wanted the moment to end.

Then she had been leaning towards him and clutching him closer, and he had been in shock as she kissed him. He had hesitated. Not because he didn't want it, hadn't wanted it for so long, but because she was so weak and so disoriented. And he wondered whether she was just doing it because she was grateful that he had found her. But her lips had been so warm and soft and all he wanted was to crush his hand in her hair and pull her closer, then climb into bed with her and run his hands down her body, to be with her _finally, _the way he had wanted to for so long.

But she had been in pain and when he heard her gasp, he felt like a freaking pervert, thinking about sex when she had been so hurt and he hadn't even had Hershel come down and make sure he was okay. He had left as fast as he could.

After that, there hadn't been a moment alone with her. He had thought as he left that when he came back, they could finally have it out between them. He'd say what he felt even if it embarrassed the hell out of him and maybe she felt the same, and then they could go forever together. And now that was all gone. He was never going to see her again and he'd never know what she would have said. And he hadn't even said goodbye.

The next couple days with Merle played out the way they always had before. Fighting, hunting together, arguing, protecting each other. But something had changed. He loved his brother, hell, he had to and always had and always would. But it wasn't enough. They couldn't live like the two of them had done before here in this new world.

The tension was building in him every hour that they stayed away from the prison. Merle wasn't stupid. He knew he was trying to get them headed back to the prison. They were sniping at each other more than usual. It finally came to a head when his brother grabbed him by the collar and pushed him to the ground. They had it out between them, and he told Merle he was headed back. Then he turned in the direction of the prison and moved as fast as he could.

If Merle wanted to follow, he would. It he didn't, well, hell, he'd just have to learn to live with it. He had before. The only thing that mattered anymore was getting back. To the prison, to the group, and to her.


	22. Chapter 22

**A/N I am having total writer's block so have been sitting on this chapter for two weeks. Finally, I decided to break it into two just to get back into the habit of posting. So this is the "prologue" if you will, and Part II will be the actual fulfillment of the title. Lame? Probably. But I need to do something to get back into the groove! Thanks as always for all the feedback, I truly appreciate it!**

**The First Time Merle Saw Them Together (Part I)**

His brother was leading them back to this prison. The pace was brutal, which he figured was at least in part designed so they wouldn't talk none. He followed him silently for awhile, pushing through the trees and brush after his brother. Daryl had said he was going back, whether he came with or not, but he noticed that his little brother still looked back every so often, always when he got too far behind and he couldn't hear him move. Merle found himself dropping back a little more each time just to see it. Just to make sure his brother was still looking back to see if he was following, even as he led them on a relentless march back to these people. It reassured him somewhat. Made him think that maybe his little brother had spent the last year thinking on where he was, just like he had been doing the same.

It was different somehow now between them. The balance of power, if that's what it had been, had shifted slightly. Not like he wasn't still older and wiser, _hell_ no. Nothing on earth could change that. But it was still different that it had always been.

The sight of his brother's back had shaken him more than he liked to admit. He felt awkward with Daryl suddenly, in a way he never had before. He'd watched his little brother from the day he was born, red and squirmy and pressed against their mama's breast. He remembered it vividly because it was one of the few times he had ever seen their parents not yelling their heads off at each other. He'd watched him from that day on. Through his first gummy little smile to his first wobbly steps to his first fight (he'd come home crying about the bigger kids pushing him around, grubby fists rubbing his eyes, until Merle had marched him back down to the playground to force him to kick some ass). He'd watched him all these years but never felt this way around him. Uneasy. Itchy. Having to be careful in his talk and thoughts. He didn't like it.

He'd told his brother earlier that he hadn't know what the old man had done to him. That was both true and a lie. He'd known it and not known it, if that made any damn sense. When he had left - and it had either been leaving or killing the bastard - he knew the old man wasn't likely to change. Knew he was as likely as to stop drinking as a leopard to change his spots. But he honestly thought it might be different for Daryl. Merle was the antagonist, the asshole. He and the old man had been in each other's faces from as far back as he could remember. Too alike, too stubborn, too quick to anger.

But Daryl had always been the sweet one. And to this day, every time Merle looked at him, he saw his mama's same puppy dog eyes looking back. He had thought when he left that that might still mean something to the old man. And even though he heard through the grapevine gossip in town that the bastard was still as mean and wild and drunk as ever, he hadn't really put it together. What it might mean for his little brother who he left behind.

Hell, every time he called back - whether from basic training, or wherever he'd been stationed, or just from some one night stand's bedside phone - it had sounded like his brother was okay. Every time he had gotten ahold of Daryl (which, granted, wasn't often), the kid sounded just as even-keeled and stoic as usual. Never gave him a hint that he needed him. Never let on that the old man was doing the same thing to him that he had done to Merle all those years.

At the back of his mind though, the thought niggled. Maybe his brother _had _tried to let him know. And maybe he had been too stoned or too drunk or too….preoccupied to hear what his brother had been saying. Too relieved to have gotten away from it all to hear it from his baby brother. But it didn't matter at the end of the day, did it? They were together now. And if his brother had asked him to have come home, he would have gone back and killed their daddy. So it shouldn't matter because surely his little brother didn't mind being knocked around a little if it meant, at the end of the day, that ole Merle was out of prison and here to take care of him now.

He kept trying to reassure himself of that as he followed along. But it was tough. Without the drugs and the high, it was a hell of a lot harder to convince yourself of shit that didn't seem all that believable. Still, he kept trying.

As they marched, he regarded his brother carefully. He'd never seen Daryl like this unless they were hunting. So focused, so determined. He couldn't really figure it out. What the hell was so special back at the prison? Sure, he'd noticed that _Officer Friendly_ seemed damned _friendly_ with his brother back on the road, but then so had that Chinese kid and his little girlfriend. All of them standing around and whining on about "family," from what he had overheard on the road. That was bullshit. Daryl and him were the only family each other had in the world. Shit, it was laughable. Some new "family" coming along to replace him? Replace blood? He knew he didn't have nothing to worry on that score.

Still, he couldn't understand what was driving his brother so hard. So he tried to feel him out.

He directed his question to his brother's back. "So who exactly's still holed up there?"

Daryl didn't answer.

"Still back at the precious _prison_, I mean, if that weren't clear," he deadpanned.

Daryl didn't answer.

"I mean, assumin' we ain't headed back to a bunch of corpses the Governor left behind?" His brother still didn't answer, but he watched his shoulders tighten with satisfaction. _Now we're gettin' somewhere_, he thought.

"'Course I'm already _well-acquainted_ with Officer Friendly and the Chinese…oh excuse me, _Korean_ kid," he said to his brother's back, stressing the words to get a rise out of him

He heard Daryl sigh, loudly, but he still finally answered, just like Merle had known he would.

Without turning around or slowing his pace, he explained tersely: "Rick's kids. Carl - he was at the quarry - and the new baby. Also, Hershel. It was his farm where we stayed after Atlanta. His girls. Youngest is Beth. Oldest is Maggie…but you met her already, remember?"

His baby brother finally looked back, a faint look of challenge on his face. Merle met the gaze calmly and didn't react. He hadn't done nothing to be ashamed of with that girl. Hadn't even touched her 'cept to grab her into the truck on the road and then disarm her when she had a gun aimed at his men.

He could tell his brother was annoyed not to have gotten a reaction out of that because he turned back around in a huff and picked up the pace. "Axel," he threw back over his shoulder, "just some dumbass prisoner we found locked up in the cafeteria." Then he seemed to shut himself up.

Merle hadn't known him for forty years without recognizing immediately he was holding something back. It was plain as the nose on his face. Like a shark scenting blood in the water, he grinned slightly at his brother's stiff back and feigned casualness.

"That's it? That's the oh-so-precious group who we riskin' our damn lives for?"

His brother didn't answer, and they marched for awhile in silence. Finally, he heard him bite out. "No, that ain't all. Carol's there too. She was at the quarry too." Then he picked up the pace again til Merle had to half-sprint to catch up with him.

He was genuinely puzzled. This obviously meant something to his little brother, but he couldn't fathom what. _Carol?_ _At the quarry?_ He had no damn idea who he was talking about. "Which one was she…Ah...wait…Spanish lady, big tits?"

His brother snorted and didn't turn around. Merle took that as a "no."

He thought hard again. "Tall skinny one? That was fuckin' that deputy prick?"

He watched his brother's hands come up to run through his hair in frustration. "Jesus, _no_. That's Lori, she's Rick's wife…I mean, _was_ Rick's wife. Christ, Merle."

His brother still hadn't turned around. This was getting interesting.

He tried again. "That bitchy one who never stopped yappin', you know, the black…."

Daryl cut him off, "No, _goddamit_, not her. Good Lord, how high were you back at the quarry?"

Unoffended, Merle accepted that with a shrug. He'd been pretty fucking high after all. And it wasn't like he had went around playing the Name Game with the rest of those assholes plus it had been almost a year ago to boot. His brother was on his high horse acting like he had forgotten their own granddaddy's name, rather than some random nobody back at the quarry almost a year ago. This was becoming more interesting by the second.

"_Sorrrrreeee_, little brother, looks like I hit a nerve…Look, I'm sorry I don't remember your precious _Carol_. So put me out of my misery! Which fucking one was she anyway?"

"She ain't my precious Carol, and you don't know shit."

He waited his brother out til he relented finally, just like Merle had known he would. "Carol was the one married to the asshole you drank with that one time. Had a little girl." He shut up then and shoved a tree branch aside so hard that it ricocheted back and almost hit Merle in the face. He didn't punch his brother in the back though to teach him some manners, even though he wanted to. There was pain there, and he didn't really understand it. He needed some time to think things through.

They walked in silence for several miles. Now that he mentioned it, Merle did vaguely remember her. This Carol. Not her face really but the image of her, always bending over hiding, with a little blonde girl at her side. He racked his brain as they approached this prison, trying to remember anything else about her, but it was all a haze. His brother didn't say another word the entire way to the prison.

Merle was intrigued. He just couldn't wait to meet this _Carol._

**I apologize for the abruptness - I literally cut it in two! I will try to do better with the second half :)**


	23. Chapter 23

**The First Time Merle Saw Them Together (Part II)**

They got to the precious prison just in time to save Rick's ass. Not that his brother's new best friend gave much of a thanks. He didn't say anything really, just stared at them like he was seeing things. Truth be told, Merle was a little speechless himself - Officer Friendly looked like shit. Sweating and pale with his hands shaking. And this was these dumbasses' leader? Merle groaned to himself just loud enough to make sure that his brother could hear it and know again what a damn foolish idea that he thought this all was.

His brother ignored him and pulled Rick along towards the front gate. Merle saw immediately that the Governor must have brought the heavy artillery from Woodbury. The main gate was down and one of the guard towers was up in flames. The dead were filling the yard. He cursed under his breath and stared daggers at his little brother's back. _Well, hot dammit lil brother, coming back to the _prison_ just seems like a better and better idea every second!_ He honestly wouldn't have given them 1000-1 odds to make it through the next week alive.

He followed closely behind Daryl as they made their way between the fences up to the main courtyard. As they got closer, the dark-haired farmer's daughter dropped her rifle and ran to unlock the gate, then she pulled it closed again behind them.

Rick broke away from them immediately and went over to a teenage kid wearing a hat and carrying a revolver. _Carl. _Merle looked at him with faint interest. He remembered him. Mostly because back at the quarry the little bastard had liked to get up at the crack of dawn and make so much fucking noise while Merle was sleeping one off. He had fantasized several times about throwing him in the lake. But the kid was different than he remembered, and not just because he was much bigger than he had been at the quarry. He seemed still now. Silent. And his stare - it wasn't the look of a little kid. It gave him the creeps. He looked away a little hurriedly to regard the rest of his brother's precious little group.

The Korean kid was standing there, seething. As Merle watched, he tightened his grip on his gun, then he tried to pull the farmer's daughter over and push her behind him as if to protect her. Merle rolled his eyes slightly. The kid was barking up the wrong tree if he thought he was after that girl.

He also recognized Andrea's little friend, _Michonne_, who crept up closer at the sight of him, clutching her katana like she'd give every hair on her head to run ole Merle through. He couldn't stop himself from giving her a wink, even as he watched her jaw tighten and her eyes narrow. He sighed to himself. Just as he expected, he didn't have any friends here among his brother's little group.

Standing close to the others was someone he didn't recognize. An old man who looked like a one-legged Santa Claus perched on crutches. This must be that farmer. The farmer was staring at him intently, as if trying to read him. _Well, good luck with that, old man, better men than you have tried and failed. _

Merle looked away to survey the rest of the yard. He didn't see this Carol or the baby neither. His brother must be thinking the same thing because he turned to Glenn and asked tersely, "Where's everybody else?"

The kid didn't answer the question though. Just spit out, "He's _not _coming in here" while staring at Merle. His brother held out his hands to the Korean kid as if to reassure him. "We can go through that shit later when we get inside." The kid snorted.

Merle rolled his eyes behind his brother's back at the kid. Here these idiots all were, just having gone through a freaking ambush at the hands of the meanest sonofabitch Merle had ever met and somehow _Merle _was the danger here. Hell, the gate was down and the damn guard tower was still on fire but this kid was looking at him like he was the Devil himself. Little _Glenn_ had a serious case of misplaced priorities.

He was about to tell him so when his brother asked again, more insistently this time, "Where's everybody else?"

Glenn finally dragged his eyes away from Merle. "Beth's inside with the baby. Carol's with Axel." He gestured to the yard behind them and that's when Merle saw her.

She was kneeling on the ground over a body. By the looks of the blood on the ground, the poor bastard had been shot to hell and back. Suddenly, as if she felt their eyes on them, she lifted her head and seemed to start at the sight of them all standing there staring at her. She got to her feet slowly and walked towards them, stopping a few feet away. She never took her eyes off his brother.

He stared at her curiously, filling in the gaps in his memory with the sight of her standing in front of him. He had vaguely remembered her as old. And yes, she was older than the two other women, although younger than himself. More close to Daryl's age. Still, she didn't fit the image that he had in his head of her from before. She had a strong face, but still pretty and delicate somehow. Young eyes. Her hair curled in little wisps around her head.

She must definitely have dressed different then. Now she wore closefitting black pants and a red long-sleeved shirt that was open at the neck and hugged her figure. He ran a practiced eye up her body. Would definitely have remembered a body like that, even as messed up as he had been, if she had dressed like that back then.

His filtered image of her from before was gray, dowdy, afraid. Now, she stood straight with a rifle held confidently in her right hand like she knew how to use it. She was covered in blood and dirt, all over her face and clothes, but she didn't look scared. She didn't cower or shrink.

Merle was fascinated. He couldn't stop staring at her. He had been fucked up most of the time at the quarry, but he was sure he would have remembered someone like this.

But that wasn't the only reason he was staring.

No, it was more because she was the only person in the courtyard, save for his brother, who was not staring at _him_, either in fear or hatred or curiosity. In fact, she wasn't even looking at him at all, just regarding his brother carefully, almost clinically, her head cocked slightly to the side, her face unreadable.

"You're back." She said it simply, as though just stating a fact. Her voice wasn't welcoming or glad, but neither was it accusing or angry. She was just acknowledging the obvious without any emotion whatsoever.

His brother seemed at a loss for words so Merle stepped in to move this little scene along.

"Yep, and with his better half, _darlin_'" At that, she shifted her gaze from his brother to him. His brother huffed in exasperation beside him, but Merle didn't look away from her face. He was fascinated by what he saw there.

He had seen a lot of looks on the faces of a lot of women over the years. Lust, anger, hatred, yearning, contempt, love, disgust. But he couldn't quite remember ever seeing a look like what he saw on her face. Just a complete and total lack of interest in him. He was fascinated all over again.

He redoubled his efforts to get a reaction out of her, smiling disarmingly, with all his charm in his face. "Should be glad, sweetheart, ole Merle is bringin' you a bargain. Two Dixons for the price of one!"

But even as he had started speaking, she was already looking away, flicking her eyes away from him back to his brother.

"Shut the fuck up, Merle," Daryl hissed beside him. He watched his little brother turn back to her.

"Carol…" he began. She simply waited, head still tilted to one side.

Well, she wasn't making this easy on his brother, whatever it was. Merle felt his estimation of her rise another couple notches. Woman had sand.

Then his brother's voice bit out suddenly, alarmed. "Carol. You hurt?" She didn't answer but he followed his brother's gaze down and saw it. Blood soaked and dripped down her hand to fall on the ground. It had seeped through the right sleeve of her shirt, the blood making a darker stain in the red fabric of her shirt.

His brother's jaw tightened and he watched him step forward quickly and grab her arm, pushing her sleeve back hurridly. Must have been somebody else's blood though because she wasn't bit or scratched, just had a long ugly scrape along her arm where a bullet must have torn through. Looked nasty though, gravel and dirt mixed in with the blood. She winced, and he watched his brother flinch. "I'm sorry," he heard his brother say in a low voice.

She hadn't reacted to his brother's hands on her, but at the sound of the apology, she wrenched her wrist from his hands and pushed roughly out at him, stepping back away from his grasp. His brother followed her, still reaching for her, but then stopped abruptly when she stepped back again away from him.

"I'm sorry," he heard his brother say again, more slowly this time, and it seemed to Merle like there was a whole lot more underlying that "sorry" than just apologizing for grabbing at that woman's wrist uninvited. He stepped forward a little himself, just to get a better look at both their faces. _This was fuckin' fascinatin'. _

The next minute though, the strange little moment was broken. A little blonde girl was coming towards them from inside the prison, a baby in her arms. The kid was screaming its head off, high-pierced choking cries. Merle looked instinctively around. That noise had to stop or they'd draw all the dead in the county towards them.

He watched as Carol moved to the girl and took the baby from her arms. She turned her back on his brother to do it, and his brother stepped closer still.

"She hungry?" his brother asked her gruffly. But she didn't answer, didn't look at him, just kept shushing and patting the baby. His brother kept watching them both.

"Carol?" He heard Officer Friendly say with relief behind them as he walked up to put his hand on her shoulder and look down at the baby. "Are you okay?" She smiled up at him and nodded. He watched Rick move his hands up and down her arms and neck to check. She didn't pull away the way she had when Daryl had touched her. He flicked his eyes over to see his brother's reaction, but his face was unreadable. Only sign that he gave a shit was that he hadn't looked away, just kept staring at the two of him.

"Axel?" Rick asked then, and Merle watched her shake her head while her eyes filled with tears.

The baby was still screaming its head off. Rick stepped closer and reached out to the little bundle in her arms. "Is she sick, Carol, should we head out for supplies?" She hadn't answered his brother, but this time she replied. "She's fine, Rick, just need to get her calmed down from all this noise. And a nap maybe, hmmmm?" she finished, smiling down at the baby. He watched the relief flood through Officer Friendly's stupid face, with his hand still resting on Carol's shoulder as he stroked the baby's face.

He looked them over intently. They looked like a unit somehow. Rick, this strange little woman, that baby. It couldn't be. Didn't make sense with what he knew of Officer Friendly, plus, the way his brother and this woman stared at each other. But seeing Rick and the woman standing there together with the kid between them, it fit somehow. He eyed his baby brother curiously, wondering if he was thinking the same thing. By the look on his face, he was.

Still shushing the baby in her arms, Carol started to walk back up to the steps leading into the cell block. He glanced over to his brother to see if they were going to follow. But Daryl seemed frozen in place.

"That it then?" his brother said to her back, "Nothing else to say?"

She stopped at the question and finally turned around to face him, again with her face calm. "I'm sorry, Daryl, what do you want me to say?"

"Don't know. Maybe that you're glad we back?" Merle winced slightly. Little Brother sounded almost like he was challenging her and this didn't seem _quite _the time to be making some kind of challenge. He wasn't exactly sure what was going on here but the lady looked like she was working through something. And Merle had seen enough women pissed off at him in his lifetime to know you had to pick your battles with this kind of shit. Not that he expected his little brother to have that same type of _skill _with women, but damn, the boy needed to learn to read a room!

She smiled slightly at his brother, but there was no warmth in it. Then she looked calmly away from Daryl to him. He met her eyes. "Nice to see you again, Merle. It's been a long time." He was so taken aback that he ended up nodding back to her.

Then she turned around without another glance at his brother and headed up the steps into the prison with Rick at her side.

He watched his brother watch the two of them walk away with the baby between them, then watched as his brother squared his shoulders and hurried after. For himself, he took one look at the group assembled in the courtyard staring at him and took off after his brother. Safety in Dixon numbers and all that shit.

Besides, for better or worse, from now on, wherever his brother was going, he was going too. And by the looks of it, where they were going was going to be spending a lot of time following this woman around.


	24. Chapter 24

**The First Time She Swallowed Her Pride**

She was just so angry. The last hour had been a roller coaster of emotions, but the only feeling that now remained, the only one that still burned through her, was anger.

She had been standing in the yard laughing with Axel when out of nowhere the bullet had torn through his skull, splattering her with his blood and brains. Her lighthearted happiness had then turned to gut-wrenching fear as she crouched behind Axel's body while the bullets had ricocheted through the yard. Then, after Maggie had laid down cover fire so that she could fall back to the barricades, she had felt only cold hatred as she took aim and shot at the bastards who had attacked their home.

When it was all over, she had run back to Axel's body and kneeled next to him with the sadness almost choking her. He had been a good man. He had been trying to earn his place. And he had died in the dirt. But in doing so, he had saved her. Just like T-Dog.

She had been too lost in her thoughts to hear the gates open, but when she finally happened to look up and had seen him standing across the yard staring at her, it felt like her heart stopped.

He was back. Just standing there tall and proud as if he had never left. Staring at her intently with _Merle _at his side. She couldn't take her eyes off him. All the hours that she had agonized over him while he had been in Woodbury, then obsessed over why he hadn't even cared enough to come back and say goodbye, and here he was standing in front of her.

She looked him up and down again and again, searching his body and face with all her focus. He looked fine. He looked rested. He looked as stoic and as untouched as ever.

He was just standing there and staring at her and it seemed that he had nothing to say. Nothing about why he had turned his back on the group and the baby and _her_. Nothing about why he had left them all. Nothing about where he had been.

Just standing there, staring. With _Merle_ at his side. It felt like the wind was rushing in her ears. He moved closer and was saying something, but she didn't hear it. She couldn't hear anything, couldn't focus on anything but his face. Suddenly, he was moving close to grab her and pull at her wrist as he yanked up her sleeve. She winced at the pain. The material was stuck and matted to her body, and it was the first time that she even realized that a bullet must have torn past Axel's body to scrape against her arm.

Like a wake-up call, the pain brought her back to herself. The moment she had seen him, she had felt relief so sharp that it had been almost agonizing, then overwhelming joy. And now so quickly it all faded away, leaving only anger.

She registered what he was saying. _I'm sorry?_ That was it? That was all he had to say? With their home on fire and in ruins all around them? With Rick so out of his mind with grief that he could barely stand? With Axel dead? And all he had to say was _I'm sorry?_

She ripped her hand out of his grasp, not even caring at the look of shock on his face. Merle was talking then but she barely registered him. She just needed to get away from him before she screamed.

Suddenly, Beth was there, frantically bouncing a screaming Judith in her arms. She took the baby and calmed her, then calmed Rick when he approached with all his worry in his face. It was a relief to turn away from _him_ and focus on the baby. It was a relief to hear the baby's cries start to subside. It was a relief to see Rick's anxiety start to fade away. It was a relief to focus on them, and not _him_.

He wouldn't let it go though. He called out to her when she would have walked away. And she wanted to spit angry words back at him to meet the challenge in his tone. Was she _glad_ he was back? Really? How dare he put this on her, when he was the one who left and she was the one who stayed.

She turned her back on him instead and walked back into the prison. Rick walked close by her, still focused on the little bundle in her arms. Once inside C Block, she turned to him. "I have to change." Her shirt and pants were filthy with sweat and dirt and blood. _Axel's_ blood. Her heart clenched at the thought of Axel, and she felt the anger at Daryl rise up again.

"I'll come with you." Rick offered. She nodded slightly, and they walked up the stairs together to the upper level. She handed Judith carefully to Rick and went to the cell where she kept the group's clean laundry ready to sort and fold. She knew Rick had his back turned, like the gentleman he was, so she quickly stripped off her shirt and pants and changed into clean clothes.

When she left the cell and walked to Rick's side, he was still faced away from her, rocking the baby back and forth. He was whispering to Judith softly, his face finally relaxed for the first time that she had seen since before Lori had died. Maybe even since back at the farm. She slipped up silently by his side and stood close to him, their shoulders pressed together as they both looked at the baby. She was so like Lori. The dark glossy hair, the bright eyes, the little rosebud mouth. They stood there companionably together in silence staring down at her, united in their love for Lori's child.

She heard the main cell door scrape open and looked down to see that Daryl had followed them in. He just stood in the cell block below and looked up at them. She met his eyes briefly and then looked back to Judith without acknowledging him. She knew he was still there though, watching the three of them on the landing above him. She willed herself not to look back at him.

Finally, she heard a commotion in the other room and she heard him stomp away. Likely _Merle_ was making himself as much of a pain in the ass as he had been back at the quarry. And _of course_, he'd go make sure _Merle_ was okay, she thought bitterly.

"You and Daryl didn't talk much," Rick observed gently beside her.

Her voice came out more clipped than she had intended. "Yes, well, I'm not sure exactly what he wanted me to say."

"Maybe that you were glad he was back?"

She snorted slightly at that and reached out to stroke the baby's cheek. Rick waited til she drew back her hand, then lowered Judith into the makeshift crib they had made out of an old Post Office box. His voice was quiet. "I thought you understood about Daryl. Why he had to leave with Merle, I mean. His code and all of that."

She started a little at Rick's words and looked over to him curiously. He wasn't looking at her, just down at the baby, but he seemed intent somehow on her answer.

"You heard about that?" She was surprised.

He tickled the baby's tummy, still not meeting her eyes. "Yeah. Beth told Carl. He told me. Not a lot of secrets around here."

She wasn't sure why, but she felt she had to explain herself to Rick. "She's so young. I just didn't want her to lose hope. And there's too little of that now. But it doesn't change what he did."

She felt him nod beside her. "Carol, I know how you feel." She doubted that, so she just looked down at the baby again. She didn't respond for a long moment as they both watched Judith's chubby little arms flail around. Finally, she shook her head. He didn't look over, but she knew he felt her movement.

"I do though. You're mad as hell, and you don't want to give it up. Even if it doesn't make perfect sense. Even if you understand why they did it. Even if they say they're sorry. You don't want to give it up. Because it gives you something to focus on. Something else to think about."

She was moved despite her anger. That was just how she felt. How could he know? It felt so odd to be standing here shoulder to shoulder with Rick, talking so quietly and intimately without looking at each other, just looking instead down at Lori's baby between them. Odd, but right somehow. So she felt she owed it to him to respond.

"I'm just too angry right now, Rick. It's too soon to put it aside. Don't you see?" She wanted him to understand. She wanted him to stop and leave her alone with her anger.

"Yeah, I know. But, if you don't do it now, it may be too late." He finally met her eyes. "I lost my chance." With that, his shoulder went up in a defeated little half shrug. She knew then that he meant Lori and her heart broke for him, standing there looking so lost, so alone. She reached for his hand and held it.

The next instant, the rest of the group was flooding into the cell block below. Maggie locked the door on Merle, who was shouting at them through the bars. Rick hurried down the stairs and she moved quickly to pick up Judith's crib and take it to one of the far cells to get her as far away as possible from the noise.

When she came back to the landing, _he_ was standing up there. She was surprised. She thought he would be at Merle's side down below. But instead he was up here. Where he knew she was.

She didn't meet his eyes or speak to him. She wasn't ready yet. But as the argument raged on below, she felt herself weaken. She didn't speak out, didn't try to shout anyone down like all the others were trying to do. But she saw very clearly what was happening. Rick was being besieged on all sides. He needed help. He needed her. And he needed Daryl. And _Daryl_ apparently needed _Merle_ in order to stay.

She knew what she to do. She had to swallow her pride and go to him and try to make this right.

When everything had calmed down below, she made her way to the cell where she knew he was. He was watchful, hesitant. He watched her come in and didn't move at all from his place on the cot. But she swallowed her anger and pride anyway (_for Rick, for Judith, for the_ _group_)and told him that she was glad that he was back. He smiled faintly at that, but still didn't move. She could feel the awkwardness, the lingering void between them. When she heard Judith cry out and Beth call for her, it was almost a relief to have a reason to get away.

She turned quickly to leave and go to Judith, but also to hide her face. There was a lump in her throat, and she knew she was about to cry. And she knew why. Since he had lost Merle in Atlanta and she had lost Sophia barely a week later, it had just been the two of them. Just her and Daryl. Not literally, of course. The rest of the group had been all around them every minute of the day. But somehow they had become each other's "firsts." He looked first to her, and she looked first to him. Even when they weren't speaking, even during those long weeks when they had been so awkward and tense with each other, through all those months before the prison, she had known somehow, strangely, inexplicably, that she came first to him, and he came first to her.

But now, in just a few days, it had all changed. Now, going forward, Merle would have to be first to him. And for her? There was Judith and Rick and Carl and Beth and all the others. Little Judith, who would have to grow up in this hellish world without a mother, who needed someone to put her first and lessen the load on her big brother. And her father, Rick, who was stretched so thin and was so weary and anxious and desperate for support. He needed her now more than Daryl did. Besides, she owed that to Lori. And Beth, trying so hard to be a mother when she was still a child herself. And Hershel and Glenn and Maggie…all of them.

It felt like it was the end somehow. Of whatever had been special between them. They had to draw back from each other, from whatever they could have been, to focus on the others around them who needed them more. To focus on the others around them who needed to come first. She felt it intensely in that moment. And somehow she knew that he was feeling it too.

"Carol?" she heard him offer behind her. She turned to face him again, her heart leaping as she searched his face. But he was silent. Finally, he just shook his head and looked down again at his lap. "Nothin'. Never mind." He didn't look up again.

She turned and left the cell without another word to tend to Judith. He wouldn't leave again, she knew that. At least there was that. He'd stay for Rick and the baby. He'd stay for the group. And she was part of the group so that must mean he was staying for her, even if just in a small way. That had to mean something, right? Even if he wasn't staying _just _for her, even if it wasn't the way she wanted it between them or ever would be. That definitely meant something.

She took a deep breath and squared her shoulders as she walked away. She had to put it all away. There was too much else to focus on. Making sure Judith was fed, helping Rick reinforce the barricades, figuring out what to make for supper tonight, trying to do whatever she could to keep the others and Merle from killing each other. Too much to focus on to be worried about her _feelings _at a time like this.

She wasn't angry at him anymore anyway. She only felt sad.

**A/N - Thank you everyone for the feedback! I'm just so blocked with this story right now. I think it's because I'm coming to the end of Season 3 of the show and not sure how to go on, given what could happen. But I truly appreciate the feedback - THANK YOU!**


	25. Chapter 25

**The First Time He Felt Accepted**

He had lived his whole life in Merle's shadow. Five years older and about a hundred lifetimes cockier, Merle had already blazed a trail a mile wide through their town long before he had come around. By the time he was ready for school, all the teachers at the little local grammar school had already steeled themselves against him, just from reading his name on the attendance log. "Another Dixon," he remembered them sighing each time on the first day, with equal parts apprehension and fatigue.

By the time he was old enough to realize what being a Dixon really meant, he'd been in more fights than he could count. Against kids who wanted to show they were tougher than a "Dixon," against the younger brothers of kids Merle had beaten up along the way, even sometimes against the older brothers themselves.

By the time he was old enough to try to find work, he was turned away from every garage and warehouse in town, on the basis of his name alone. No-one wanted a Dixon, for fear he'd spend his whole shift thieving or fighting, or more likely, high as a kite. By then, with Merle off upstate and his old man God knows where, he had needed the work desperately. But he had understood why he was rejected without a second glance. Merle had already been through there, or they had seen or heard enough to know that any brother of Merle Dixon was nobody anybody decent wanted around.

He'd resented it, but also understood it, for so long that it didn't even seem to matter anymore. After all, he was part of Merle, and Merle was part of him. And fuck anybody who didn't like it. They were a team, and always had been, and always would be.

But for the past year, it had been different. For once in his life, it was Daryl Dixon _first_, Merle Dixon _second_, and after awhile, Merle Dixon third, fourth, then a very long afterthought off. Sure, Carol and Glenn and the rest of the original Atlanta crew had known Merle at the quarry but it had been for just a short time, and those frantic first days after the outbreak seemed to be a blur for them, just as they were for him. By the time they really started becoming a group, a _unit_, Merle was long gone.

And it was finally just him. They took him for himself, warts and all. When he fucked up and acted like an ass, it wasn't "Well, what do you expect from Merle Dixon's baby brother." No, it was _him _who fucked up, just him. And when he did something good, it wasn't "Well, Merle was always stronger, faster, better" or "Well, _that's_ surprising coming from Merle Dixon's brother." It was just _him_ that did it, just him.

Good or bad, it was just him. And as much as he had missed Merle, as much as he had tormented himself wondering what had happened to him and whether he could have done more to look for him, he had had to admit it to himself: it was nice. It was nice finally to be just himself. Not "one of those Dixons." Not "Merle's baby brother." Just himself.

But since Woodbury, everything had changed. And, as usual, it was all because of Merle. They had been accepted back into the prison group. But uneasily, and with nothing but suspicion. And now they all, _even Carol_, looked at him the same way they did Merle. As though the past year hadn't been for nothing.

It had just been a few days since they had come back, but he reckoned that he could cut the damn tension that hung in the air with a knife. And as usual, it was all because of Merle. Merle wasn't one to back down to nobody and nor was he was somebody to use any kind of _diplomacy_ to ease a situation along, even though he had charm in spades. Unless his brother felt like it. Which, given Merle's behavior since they got there, he obviously didn't _feel_ like it in this particular situation.

He knew that Merle was still pissed that he had forced them both back to the prison instead of taking their chances alone together on the road. But instead of taking it out on him, Merle seemed bound and determined to make everyone else regret not shooting them on sight when they came up to the gate. He softly mocked and teased Michonne every chance he got. He called out Glenn, implying that since the kid couldn't take care of his own girl at the town, he wouldn't be able to do a thing when the Governor came along. He took every opportunity to insinuate that everything Rick suggested was just going to get them all killed.

He wanted to try to make it better. Felt almost desperation to try to make it like it used to be. But what could he say? Should he try to tell Merle that Glenn - _not that Chinese kid _- had saved his ass a dozen times over the past year? That T-dog, who Merle still brought up loudly every day around the group to wonder aloud how fucking dumb he had to have been to have dropped that key, had risked his own life to make sure they all had food and then died trying to protect the prison they had fought for? That even Michonne, who he barely knew, had brought Little Asskicker the formula that kept her alive, then went with them to Woodbury to fight and now stayed even though the Governor's assault seemed inevitable? What was the point? Merle wouldn't have given a shit about any of it.

And what could he say to the others? Tell Michonne that Merle wasn't _really _mocking her when he called her a _Nubian princess_, that he just didn't know any better? He knew Merle was just trying to get a rise out of her, but it didn't matter, the result was the same. Should he tell Glenn that what Merle had done to him at the town was only the same thing that he had done to that kid back at the farm? That it wasn't nothing personal, and in fact, Merle had told him with grudging admiration on the road that the kid had showed a lot of sand? Glenn wouldn't have cared.

He just couldn't think of anything to say to make it better to any of them. Every idea he thought of and then rejected just sounded pathetic, even to himself. He knew he wasn't no good at this type of stuff. It had always been _Merle_ with the silver tongue. _Merle _who people had listened to (when they weren't trying to kill his brother for being an asshole, that was).

So he did nothing. Didn't say nothing to no-one. Just tried to keep everyone separated and away from each other's throats. Followed Merle around just as dogged as a tick, trying to make sure his brother didn't piss anyone off too much to the point that the group would throw them both out, while all the while making sure no one got close enough to attack Merle in a rage for some dumb ignorant shit he said.

And caught between them - Merle and all the others - he felt more alone than he ever had in his life. He knew that Merle couldn't understand why the hell they were staying with the prison group like a bunch of lambs waiting for the slaughter. And he knew that everyone else wondered why he had brought Merle back there after all the shit he had done dating all the way back from Atlanta up through Woodbury and now to the prison.

But he felt trapped. He couldn't leave the prison, but he also couldn't leave Merle. And as much as he tried to fight it, it felt like he was a little boy again, following along behind in Merle's footsteps, good and bad, judged by how everyone viewed his brother, and no longer looked at for himself. At least growing up, he had known what to expect. But now? After being a part of the group and now feeling that all fade away around him every passing day, he felt totally adrift.

Until that day.

He had gone to the upper cell where he had been storing Merle's and his things. Figured he'd pull some supplies together and take Merle out on a hunt. Anything to get him away from the others for awhile.

He was still inside the cell when he heard Rick come up the stairs and call to Carol. He stilled and strained to hear them down the hall from his cell. She said something too quiet for him to hear and then laughed softly, and when Rick joined in, he resisted the urge to step out of the cell to see what the hell they were doing together. Jesus, he had only been gone a few days but it seemed like the two of them had formed a little unit. One that left him out.

After the tense moment in the courtyard when he and Merle had come back, Carol had come to find him and say welcome back. But it had felt all wrong. When he had left her after just having found her in the tombs - _was it only a few days that had passed? - _she had twined her fingers in his hair and pulled him close and kissed him. He had spent the whole march to Woodbury and the days afterwards thinking of her and that kiss and wondering what to say when he got back. And then when he did, she had all but ignored him in the yard, then greeted him like he was someone she had just met in the cell.

And Rick? He seemed like he was holding on by a thread. He needed help. But instead of looking to him, the past couple days he had instead been coming across him and Carol, standing close together, talking softly, holding the baby between them. It just felt like he had been pushed out. And, as usual, it was all because of Merle. If he had never left Rick and Glenn and Maggie on the road...if he had never found Merle...maybe it would all be different. Instead, it was turning out just the way it always had in the past.

Rick's voice interrupted his thoughts. "We need more weapons and ammo if we're going to fight off anything coming from Woodbury." He heard Carol murmur a reply, then Rick continued, "I'm thinking of heading back home, I mean, to where me and Carl and Lori…" Rick stopped abruptly, then started again, in a stronger voice. "Shit, I mean, I left a damn near arsenal back at the sheriff's station. If I could make it there, get what we needed, we'd be a helluva better off than we are now."

She didn't speak for awhile, and he knew that she was thinking about Rick's idea. Considering it carefully, weighing it, the way she always did. He found himself leaning forward to hear what she would say.

"Then you should go. As soon as possible." He wasn't surprised at her answer. Despite how gentle and kind she was, she was a realist. He had heard what she had said to Andrea about going back to the town. She would do what it took to protect them all, and she recognized and supported the same thing in the others.

Rick hesitated, then he heard him continue, "I'm worried about leaving. I want Michonne with me, but I can't take Daryl without Merle, and it's asking for trouble to have Michonne and Merle along together, given their history...But I don't want to leave Merle here with Glenn and Maggie and you…" Rick trailed off, and he felt himself flush and clench his fists. Goddammit, did everyone still think that Merle was some kinda animal to attack the people at the prison, but most of all, that he would stand by and let Merle hurt any damn one of them?

The two on the landing were silent for a long while, then Carol spoke again, "Seems like there isn't much choice."

"No," Rick agreed, then continued, "I guess what I'm asking is, what do you think of leaving Merle here?"

"He won't go back to Woodbury, if that's what you mean. He'd never leave Daryl."

"No," Rick agreed, "but what I mean is, what do you think about leaving him here with you all? I mean, you know him better than me. You knew him for days back at the quarry. I met him for ten minutes when he was high out of his mind a year ago." He paused, "You're the only one I can ask. Carl was too young back then. Glenn's too angry now. I need your advice - is it safe to leave him?"

He heard her pause again for the longest time. His heart was in his throat to hear her answer.

She finally spoke. "Merle was an asshole back at the quarry. Seems to still be now. But he wouldn't hurt one of us without a _reason_. Which he's lost now that he's thrown in with us against the Governor. And he wouldn't do anything to hurt Daryl."

Her voice was dry and clinical, but then it changed, and with sudden heat she continued, "But none of that really matters, Rick. Merle doesn't _matter_. It's only Daryl who matters. We need to do whatever we can to keep him here. He's one of us. And he needs Merle. So we need Merle."

Rick was silent. "Yeah. That's right," he agreed. Then, "I'll take Carl and Michonne and leave tomorrow. I'll let Daryl know he's in charge while we're gone."

He heard their steps as they walked down the stairs to the others and he sagged against the wall, letting out the breath he had been holding. It would be okay. No matter how much ground he still had to make up with Rick and Carol, nothing _fundamental _had changed between the three of them. They still wanted him. Even despite Merle. They _accepted_ him.

It felt like coming home.

**A/N I have been on such a hiatus over the summer, equal parts vacation and total writer's block! I couldn't think of how to continue and also keep this story somewhat true to the show so I just shut down! However, the promos for the new season have made me excited again, so hopefully, this is a good try to get back into the swing of things!**


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